Cases Please!

Dearest, delectable justices and the bailiff whose prefixes depend on the mood of others, I need help. I have DMed one shots and mini campaigns in the past, but I started my first big girl campaign yesterday as a DM. Unfortunately, it was not the stunning opening I was hoping for. The campaign is set in Stormreach during the 200th Mourning Day Parade. An explosion took place, killing some members of the Sovereign Host and sending a deep purple firework into the sky that left behind a spider image. Three of my players followed a cloaked figure that was seen fleeing the scene with two of them running and another, an Air Genasi genie warlock that is themed after Remi Le'Beux, followed behind at more of a light jog/walk. This character is played by my house mate, we will call Jacques. The fourth player, my husband we will call Jack, is playing a dragonborn knight of the Silver Flame (the offspring of a Kobald and a White Dragon, two characters that came up in my mini campaign last year. This isn't relevant, just thought I'd share.). He ran to a priest from the Silver Flame float and helped bring him to get healed. During this, the trio all caught up with each other in an alleyway known as The Slums, where they picked a fight with a Goliath barbarian. Jacques was the one who picked the fight, drawing first blood with an eldritch blast, while another players character managed to land the killing blow with her pitchfork. (Yes, a pitchfork. The other player has a rolling pin and a wooden spoon as her weapons. Don't worry about it) It was at this point, when the player was pulling her pitchfork out of the poor Goliath's abdomen, that the dragonborn ran up on the scene. Naturally, Jacques decided his player would run off, chasing after the cloaked figure. The other two stood still. Jack threw them a rope asking them kindly to tie themselves up as he chased after who he believed to be the third evil doer. Great. Fun times. Well, eventually they ran into a door blocking there way where the four met up with Jack ramming Jacques's character into the door so he couldn't get away. Jacques proceeded to eldritch blast Jack but failed his roll. The session ended with the door opening and a deep purple light pulsating in the depths below, beckoning them on. End of session! We survived! Well, not even five minutes after, Jacques, in real life, decided that Jack's character was dumb for following him instead of arresting the other characters. The argument was that Jack saw the girl pull her pitchfork out of the Goliath. Jack's argument was that both of them stayed and Jacques was the only one who ran, so he put his trust in them to stay and chased the runner. 10 minutes of yelling later, Jack slammed the door as he went to the garage and Jacques began to make his way upstairs. Jack came back in, said goodbye to everyone and made Jacques hug him as Jack apologized. Jacques then went to his bedroom and Jack pouted for the rest of the night because he felt bad. Jack went and apologized again later in the evening. I am now in the weird position of 1. living with my husband and his best friend who are fighting and 2. Jacques emailing me a full new character (Basically Frieren from the anime) saying he doesn't see how their two characters could move past this... Who's at fault? Are they both to blame? Should I force them to share full sized beg I have stored for guests? (Jack is 6foot 3 and Jacques is 5foot 10). I lay this matter at your feet. I don't want to run a session 2...

Dear disciples of Dice Christ, Last year, I began playing a true D&D campaign for the first time. For the first few sessions, I borrowed whatever dice my spouse had lying around the house until I had the chance to buy some unique dice of my own. It was about 4 sessions in, my half-orc College of Swords Bard was doing some crazy hits in combat. I was hitting every time and rolled two nat-20s in a row. I even rolled a third nat20 later in combat, but I lied about it thinking my fellow players would accuse me of cheating, and said I got a dirty 20 instead. However, this is not the main dilemma for which I feel the deep pang of guilt. Once the session was over, I was holding the die in my hand that kept rolling so high, and realized it was not a traditional d20, but a Magic the Gathering countdown die. I’m sure most of you know what that means with the amount of MTG references I’ve heard, but for clarity, this means all the high numbers are clustered on one side of the die and the low numbers on the other side. I genuinely did not realize this mistake until this moment, and I tried to make myself feel better by telling myself I was still giving the die a good shake in my hand before rolling, so it was still random. I have since taken that die out of play, and my campaign is still going strong; however, both these sins still eat away at me. Will dice Christ absolve me of this sin, or must I spend time in dice purgatory?

I bequeath this case to the justice esquires and the dastardly man you call a "balif", I bring you the case of the almost immediately ruined character trope. I started playing in a new campaign started in my friend group, and the character I chose to make was a knight, one who promised to never take off his helmet after his tragic past to hide his face, including in the story that he might downright have a meltdown without it. Session one, we all awake on a beach after our ship crashed. Each party woke up missing something that we had to find, cool little thing to search for and all that, cool I thought originally. Judges, the dm decided my character was missing his helmet, the thing I made sure to write down was integral to the character. I panicked a little and immediately asked if I could look for, a nat 20 on an investigation later and I did, but the dm told me after that the DC was over 20 already so without such a high roll I wouldn't have been able to find it. It all worked out, and the campaign fizzled out unfortunately, but still. The fact that an integral part of my character and how he played was almost immediately taken away forever from me has sat wrong with me to this day. Should I have said something in the moment, or always trusted the judgement of a dm who's campaign went poorly enough to fizzle out? I trust your judgment with full confidence

To the delegates of Dice Christ and Dan, I come asking for forgiveness. My party and I play with opt in massive damage rules so if an attack deals more than half your hp, you can opt in to roll on a massive damage table to have something extra happen, like a scar or the loss of a limb. Basically a simple way to add more flavor to combat. Through a series of unfortunate accidents, the rouge ended up 1v1ing a six headed hydra. The hydra, through six attacks, dealt more than half the rouges hp. Before I could say otherwise, my player joyfully exclaimed, “Hell Yeah! I love consequences!!” And then rolled before I ever told her to. What she rolled was to have her characters arm ripped off. Judges…she was overjoyed. She was so excited that I couldn’t bring myself to clarify that because the hydra had six attacks, it wouldn’t count as massive damage because it has to be done in a single attack. Instead of playing by the rules, I simply narrated the hydra ripping off the rouges arm and have carried this lie with me ever since. It weighs on my soul. May I ever be forgiven?

To the bone dry justices and the slightly soggy bailiff, I bring to you the case of the OP spider. I’ll cut straight to the point. It was our final session. I was playing an Elven Warlock named Alanis, as it is a dope ass name and whoever came up with it is quite cool. While finishing up the campaign we ended up in a field equidistant from a wizard tower (our end goal) and a random city the dm wanted us to explore. So we determine to go to the tower first to finish up our current quest line. This was apparently contrary to what the dm had planed. The DM groaned a bit about us not going to his cool city, then got a funny look in his eye and narrated my character’s shoe getting stuck in the mud. So I pull my foot out, grab the shoe, and put my foot back in. SURPRISE! In the shoe was a spider that then bit me and poisoned me without a save. That poison PARALYZED ME INSTANTLY and the DM was adamant that I would be unable to move for the next three days. And that’s how the campaign ended. A full year of play finished with my character paralyzed in the mud with no story arcs completed. So I ask you this, was the DM right to “railroad” us in such a way? All in all it doesn’t really matter, this is just a thing that will come to mind every once in a while and I’ll get pissed off all over again. I await your response. PS: I have many examples of this dm being……interesting in his rulings but that is a case for another day

Dear Deacons of Dice Christ and Jake, the owner of the religiously significant Bird-lesque, I come before you with my rinky toes lowered in deep supplication. After being inspired by your campaigns and receiving encouragement from my partner and friends, I started a D&D campaign! I'm a first time DM and most of the players are new to D&D. Everyone seems to be having a good time, but I have come to realize somewhere I am significantly lacking: who to attack in combat. In my arrogance, I thought targeting my partner and friends with lethal violence would come naturally. I was mistaken. I try to be logical about who each enemy would attack, but I still end combats with some characters unconscious while others are completely untouched. I can't help feeling that this is a failure on my part and that I may be ruining the D&D experience for the new players at the table. I pray that you will show me mercy and absolve me of my sins as you look down on me from your lofty, yet tasteful, 3D-printed dice towers.

To the glorious judges & bailiff; the whimsical Caldwell Tanner, the perspicacious Brian Murphy, the ensorcelling Emily Axford, and the big Joke Hurwitz- I bring to you the case of the Boarhide Belt- I play a dwarf sorcerer (aka dwarferer) in an island-hopping campaign run by my two friends, Josh & Allen, who switch off DMing. On one of Josh's islands, I purchased a homebrew item made by Allen called the Boarhide Belt for 200gp. This belt gave me the Squat Nimbleness feat and considered me a small creature for squeezing through spaces. For 14 sessions across 293 days I used the belt to do things like squeeze through caves or escape an exploding factory. We made it to the next shopping opportunity (still on Josh’s island) when Allen said, "Oh I forgot something". He asked if I had attuned to the belt. I didn’t think I had to since it wasn't in the item description. He then said, "Let's just retcon that you haven't actually attuned to it yet." I then attuned, put on the belt, and promptly transformed into a greased pig. Hoping to have some fun with the situation, I said I wanted to bust out of the tavern room we were in and cause a ruckus. I was asked to make an intelligence save, which I failed because my intelligence was now 2. I was told I was frightened, couldn't move, and thought that "everyone wants my bacon”. It was this point that our party wizard rescued me by casting dispel magic, temporarily ending the polymorph effect. Allen then tells me I got the first of the “dud” items. After the session, I expressed some frustration that I essentially lost an item that I enjoyed using. I asked if at some point in the campaign I could have it fixed to work as it did before, to which both DMs said, "Yeah that sounds like a cool story beat". Justices, we have been on indefinite hiatus and may never resume this campaign. I ask the court, what is the statute of limitations for instituting a retcon? If there was intent to remedy my slight, is that enough? What if that never happens? Thank you, and Dice Christ’s blessings- Magnar Kragstone

A somewhat stomach filling welcome to the justdices, and a lil belly rub for Jake “The Hurwitz” Hurwitz In may I started running a campaign for 6 of my long time friends, it’s my first time DMing and their first time playing. It was shaping up to be a great time with everyone being very invested, but one friend(that of which I’ve known the longest) insisted his character be called Tome Cruise, a cleric of Zenu. I, being a fresh faced lil baby DM, shook my rattle and happily accommodated him. Now my campaign is chock full of mission impossible references, Scientology pamphlets, and downright impossible missions justified with “but it’s tom cruise”. Now that our current campaign is entering its end phase, I asked my players to start considering their next character. As I’m in my living room one day my Mission impossible loving friend tells me that he wants his next character to be a warrior of the street monk named Jackal Chain. Justices and Jorm, would I be wrong to tell my roommate and best friend Hell no to his pop culture carnival of characters, or should I let him play pretend with me however he wants. I humbly await your judgement P.S. Hiii!

A warm and inviting welcome to the justices and a…. Who is that guy I think his name is Josh? I play in a game of pathfinder as a Lizardfolk bloodrager named Gaxzou. While traveling we stopped at a town where we discovered a cultist of the evil necromancer. We caught them and I shoved my hand in their mouth to prevent verbal spells which caused me to roll a con save against a disease. I rolled a 2 in fear of disease my character and are necro-knight left to find a healer. Eventually are rogue got tired of waiting (all of 5mins) and grabbed the cultist bound them and broke their fingers and decided to march them through the streets the dm then narrated how guards immediately noticed the tied up woman and demanded answers instead of trying to reason he demanded that the party kill the guards, I refused as my character doesn’t kill town guards that did nothing wrong. I refused and so did the necro knight. And he proceeded to call us cowards as he was taken down in not even a turn of combat. We were all escorted to jail and we lost the cultist and he blames us for not fighting 30 guards. Am I wrong and a coward for not fighting when he demanded or was it ok not to fight Ps: we still play together and this has been really the only hiccup.

Not a case but an update on the case of the tiny frog! You may remember a case I submitted some time ago asking whether it was fair that the tiny frog my Druid had wildshaped into had slipped on an icy bridge and fallen ALL the way to the edge and over. Well, I’m happy to update that we concluded our Rime of the Frostmaiden campaign over the hoglidays, and not only did our party defeat the Frostmaiden and save Faerun from an endless winter (and had an emotional epilogue with genuine tears), but my DM did a little nod to our dungeon court case during his amazing slideshow recap, featuring a gif that he had somehow found of a very sad little cartoon frog sliding across some ice. I’m glad there were no hard feelings on either side, and we all had a good laugh about my unhappy tiny frog (don’t worry, my Druid got her badass wildshape moment during the finale, when she took down a gargantuan bird monster in her Giant Scorpion form).

Heartiest of hellos to the humble, heroic & hopeful judges, as well as brief hand wave to the haggard & haunted bailiff. I present the case of the OP one shot character. I am the longtime DM of a campaign for my best friend, little brother & brother in law. My little brother graciously offered to run a one shot around Christmas time so I could get the chance to play again, and so he could run a heist that he’s been building. I hurriedly and excitedly agreed, having not played a PC in 3+ years, and let him know that I’d be making a somewhat busted character (gloomstalker rogue/battlemaster fighter) with a focus on melting bad guys. Once my character was built, I said I wanted to run through the character with him to ensure I didn’t screw over his heist. My little brother responded “whatever, I can handle him.” Here comes the issue, we made our way into the first combat of the session, stopping a rival thief from making off with a special key that we needed, and my brother said “let’s see how quickly you can melt this guy.” I did 125 damage in one round instantly killing said thief, and while my party members cheered gleefully, my little brother stared at me with a mix of disgust and curiosity, and while we went on and completed the heist, my brother said “you’re not allowed to use that character ever again.” Now justices, my question is, is it my fault that he did not want to double check my character or should I have made someone less optimized?

Clerics of the Crit I come to you with a confession, one that has sort of weighed my shoulders a little bit. Many moons ago, my party's Changeling Paladin died heroically protecting us from the fuzzy fists of a Yeti. As the group's druid, the task of resurrection fell to me and the absurd whims of her Reincarnation spell. He would return to us as a new, randomly decided, lineage. Judges, he loved being a Changeling. So when I rolled on our expanded lineage table, I announced that he would be revived miraculously as a Changeling, and not the Human I had actually rolled for him to become. I altered his story, and perhaps the rest of his life. Is there any hope for me? Please say yes.

To the juicy justices and the buxom bailiff, Years ago in college I was in a game with a group of friends and a friend of a friend who was a “main character”, let’s call him Block. Block would generally be annoying and get our group in trouble in non fun ways with the excuse of “I’m chaotic neutral”, which caused half of us to usually be annoyed. Yes he was a bard. One day we were playing, and our characters were sleeping at night. We had a warforged Druid (guy would only play dnd if he could be a Transformer) player named Toyota Overdrive who we’d have keep watch since he would need to sleep the least. Our rogue (Veronica) wakes up and asked if anybody notices her, we all roll and fail our perception checks and the rogue starts doing SOMETHING to the warforged, we’re all intrigued with what she is planning. But then before she’s done Block goes “WAIT, my passive perception passes the check!” And he wakes up and catches the rogue, who’s able to pass a deception check to get out of answering about what they tried to do to the warforged. A lot of us were disappointed, because we wanted to know what was going on, the warforged player being the most disappointed. At a later time we asked Veronica what she was planning, and she said we forgot, so to this day years later some of us talk about how we wish the plot was allowed to unfold. So my question is, was it wrong for Block to retroactively pass the perception check, killing a plot point, or was it the right way to play the game and our annoyance come from us already being biased against him? Covid hit and we all graduated college and moved apart so we don’t all play together anymore, but I still get annoyed/disappointed when I think about it. I humbly await the fair but cruel punishment that awaits

Dearest Mork, Ermp, Clomp, and Jake. Sorry, I couldn’t remember the baliff’s name so I just put something that sounded dumb. I bring you the case of the impatient rogue. This happened over 10 years ago on my first session of DnD when my best friend was introducing it to me in 8th grade. I joined their campaign of 5 people as they were in the middle of some dungeon they were midway through. My character was a rogue, and after we had gone through a very long combat sequence, finished looting the room, made our way to leave the dungeon. We were met with a mysterious hallway full of statues, with a door at the end. The group sat and debated what we should do for about 30-45 minutes, not rolling any checks beyond a single perception check. I got bored, so I told the DM that I was going to roll a stealth check and try to sneak past the statues to the door at the end of the hallway (to some of the party’s disagreement). Somehow, I rolled a 34, feeling good. I made my way into the hallway, and was immediately rained with arrows from these magical statues, now feeling less good about my decision. What followed was mass panic from the entire party because now they had to save me as i was knocked unconscious immediately and they had not factored this into the last 30 minutes of discussion. Through some good rolls and clutch decisions, everyone made it through the door somewhat concious, but I was chastised by our paladin who had to do most of the saving. Now, I’m not upset that a 34 sneak did not work on magical statues, because I did not understand at the time that magic can supersede quietly crouching around, no matter how light-footed you are. I argued that we weren’t getting anywhere, and that by making my choice, I got the group moving and eventually through the hallway, even if I was unconscious for most of it. The paladin thinks that I should have just waited for the group to make a plan. Who was in the wrong here? It’s been in the back of my mind ever since, and I’m not sure who was in the right here. I await your decree nonchalantly, like I don’t even care really. P.S. the 34 sneak became a running joke for the rest of the campaign and no one was actually upset afterwards. I think the DM even gave me inspiration for it because he was probably tired of waiting around, too. We went on to play for the next 3-4 years together.

Dear Supreme Crit Justices and that oh so handsome rat man, Jank. I present to you the case of suggestion shutdown. My character is a chaotic level 3 wizard named Piss Angle in my friends 5e homebrew campaign. While traveling, our party ran into a troupe of traveling performers and exotic barterers. One of the barterers was a strange half-orc that said he had some treasures we could see in his wagon for a gold of admission. After some fuckery from our bard to get in without paying, the party goes inside to see among other things, a magical sword and an immovable rod. Our bard at the table really wanted that rod, as did I; and our barbarian wanted the magical sword. The barbarian was about to pay for the sword when our DM mentioned that this half-orc likes to gamble. So our barbarian challenged him to a card game for it. After many rounds where the whole party stopped the orc from cheating, and inspiring the barbarian, the game came down to one final hand. It was at this moment that the bard decided to cast suggestion, one of his only level two spells. He told the half-orc he should go double or nothing- we give him all our gold if we lose, or give us the rod as well as the sword if he lost. The half-orc rolled the save and failed, and then WITH A NAT 20, the Barbarian won the hand. We were ecstatic. That is until the DM tells us all “I am not giving you that rod.” Justices, me and the bard shared a broken hearted look across the table. Our DM reasoned that he thought the rod would be too game breaking, especially for such a chaotic character as Piss. Should my DM have given us the immovable rod, or was he right to keep it out of Piss Angle’s hands?

To the formidable justices of the crit and the feeble bailiff, Jacob. I have been running Curse of Strahd, using Dragnacartas Reloaded (shout out!) for the past year. The paladin missed a few sessions and had to join the party in vallaki, so I had Ismark lend this player a horse to meet the others. They encountered wolves on the road (heavily bloodied from a fight the rest of the party won last session) that injured the horse. The paladin wanted to “mercy kill” the horse and get rations of horse meat. Later in the session someone made a joke about the Horse being Ireena’s pet and the rest of the party and I ran with it, including them casting sending to let Ismark know the horse was safe while lying to Ireena that the horse was back home. They have also been feeding Ireena meat from her horse without telling her. Now almost a year later, the party returned to the Village of Barovia where obviously Ireena and Ismark both learned of their lies. There was some very intense and dramatic role play of Ireena feeing betrayed by the party, for lying to her about not only killing the horse but Feeding It To Her. There was also a reveal that the horse was a gift from Ireena’s deceased mother, and ultimately there were almost tears at the table and our sorcerer’s Very Close Friendship with Ireena came into question. the paladin felt extremely bad for everything. I’m coming to you to ask if I should have just let this joke in passing go, without having Ireena question her trust in them or if I was right for going head first into the bit and cranking it to 1000%. (To be clear this is all in good fun and everyone did laugh after the session about it but the paladin feels So Bad)

To the pretty good Supreme Crit Justices and that Hot Rod Dad Bod Jakey, I present the case of the Adventuring Job Interview. A few years ago, I was asked to join a D&D game by a coworker who knew I had just started playing and that I did musical theater as a hobby. He said I would probably be good at RP so I should join a game he was about to start. He told me that I could help him pull his combat focused players into more RP, which he had been wanting to do. I agreed because he looked like he really needed the help but when the first session started and we went to the Adventurers Guild to look for work, he said that we had to apply to be adventurers. He proceeded to hold interviews with each player to decide if we were ready to adventure but he failed everybody but me and called the other guys murder hobos, in character. He texted me under the table to say that it was because I was the only one who did "good RP." The group was then mad at me for some reason. I was going to call him out but then he saw what I was feeling and texting me "please please please dont say anything. I want to have them so other things that will force more RP. Besides adventuring and killing." I agreed not to say anything but the entire time the rest of the group was still passed at me for being accepted and was super short with me. I did what I could to try and force RP but they didn't want to talk with me anymore. The game had 2 more sessions before we disbanded. I ask you, should I have spoken up or was I right to try and help the DM at my own, and the groups, expense?

To the undefinable Supreme Crit Justices and the guy who you clearly only keep around so we can make cheap jokes about a cheap man. I think his name is Jeb? I bring to you the case of Bart Simpson, the world's most hated NPC. I was DMing a campaign and the PCs were traveling to the Abyss to meet with a succubus warlord. During the meeting, I briefly introduced the warlord's bodyguards, which included a wispling (half gnome/half demon). I described him as “pacing back and forth behind the warlord, with his hands resting on hand axes” and “he has short and spiky hair. Kind of like Bart Simpson.” I got some light razzing for this description, but we quickly moved on. The meeting with the warlord went well and the PCs were offered to stay the night as guests. That evening, the bodyguard was sent to deliver a message to the PCs. As soon as their room door was opened, the party fighter attacked the wispling, followed immediately by the party sorcerer plane-shifting him to his god's home plane (where the demon would be hunted for sport). Despite having never spoken a word, my PCs had unanimously decided to kill the bodyguard. After the session I asked how they came to their decision. One player said, “I knew he was going to die when you described him pacing with his hands on his axes.” Two others said it was when I compared him to Bart Simpson. Regardless, they all claim that their actions were justified. The bodyguard was supposed to back stab the party during a climactic fight, so it worked out that they killed him before hand, but I ask you: Were my players wrong to kill my NPC before he technically did anything wrong, or are they just masters at sniffing out a traitorous Bart Simp-- I mean demon?

Dice Christ Confessional: A 2 for 1 on sins Long ago, three friends of mine asked me to introduce them to DnD. Our first session ended with a battle against an evil wizard (classic stuff). The dice were brutal - all three party members went down inthe fight, with the wizard still standing on 2HP. They began rolling death saves (even though the fight was pretty much over, but I was panicking about this accidental TPK). Suddenly, the sorcerer declares a third success - cheers from the players! She stabs the sorcerer in the chest, rolls enough to hit him, and everyone is super excited. Sin Number 1: A misunderstanding with the death rules - they thought characters came back with 1HP after three successes, instead of just stabilising. I did not clarify this, desperate for the newbies to fall in love with the game. Fast forward to a few months ago. We've been playing for years at this point, and had just finished a multi-year supercampaign. During our celebratory post-campaign barcrawl, someone talks about the low death count of our campaign. I casually mention that they all should've died in the very first session. Gasps from the crowd. Looks of horror. Sin Number 2: I revealed that sometimes, the Dungeon Master lies. For Murph, this is probably a triple sin, as I'm clearly breaking kayfabe. Please, representatives of Dice Christ, help me rebuild trust with my party. I had revealed sins of the past to them, but I pray that it does not prevent joy in the future. Amen

The case of the missing cat cartilage To the Honorable Justices and Dearest Bailiff Jork Help out an artsy naddpole, as no one is more qualified to solve this riddle than the Supreme Crit. If a necromancer raises a skeleton (from a freshly deceased) are only the hard bones part of the skeleton, or could e.g. cartilage be animated with it? I was relistening to campaign 1 (as you do), and as fellow cat lovers my husband and I decided to make Bubbles the cat out of clay. Here's the issue though: Many times throughout the campaign your highnesses said stuff like "scratching behind Bubbles' ears", which would imply that Bubbles has ears, however, an ear is usually not part of the skeleton of a cat. We can't come to an agreement if Bubbles should have ears or not, and so far everyone we asked has a different opinion on what is or isn't possible. So far my favorite theory I heard was that the magic that keeps the skeleton together might be kind of like a barely visible aura which could kinda follow the original shape of the cat, but my original thought process is that it's dm's discretion if the cartilage could be part of the skeleton or not. Please help us finally give a from to the most iconic kitty, 'cause right now the poor thing is just some sad wires laying around on our bookshelves.

To the honorable justices and the badass boogie boardin balif, Jakobi: I was playing in a Curse if Strahd campaign with some friends and our cleric ended up falling in love with Ismark in Barovia and he became a party NPC that followed us everywhere. The DM, though never outright, always tried (and failed) to brutally murder this fantasy husband. However, after finishing CoS, we started playing a horror ttrpg called Old Gods of Appalachia that our DM (same as before) said would be "brutal and unforgiving”. The cleric from the last game also had a squishy fantasy husband in this game that she put as a member of her backstory. On one fateful mission, the party returned to our small town to find the Player's home burned down and the chared body of her husband inside, no roll and no real chance to save him. Justices, should our husband-murder-happy DM have given us a chance to save this new boy toy, or is he within his right to kill indiscriminately in the new, explicitly unforgiving horror system? I humbly submit myself to your mercy and wisdom.

Dear Dice Christ, the highest pontifices three and memorable chalice boy Judas, For the last 4 years, I have been DM’ing a campaign of Descent into Avernus. Or, at least, I wish that were the case. Despite early discussions with my players confirming they wanted to try playing a pre-written module to see what official books have to offer, my later research led me to believe that modules MUST be adjusted and personalised for a satisfying experience. Lo and behold, several expansive plot maps and lore documents later, it turns out I’m not good at homebrew! After too many added plot threads, unbalanced encounters, and shaky sessions, my players have reiterated they do not want or need the extra bells and whistles, they want to play the module. I have begun work to get the campaign #backonbook, but we are in quite deep and I worry I have robbed my players of the Descent into Avernus experience in my excitement to prepare things for their characters myself! I feel that by betraying their expectations I have become a regular unmemorable Judas. Can Dice Christ forgive me, or should I be hit by a car? Amen.

Dice Christ Confessional: The Barefoot Shitter Cardinals of Dice Christ and the consistently disappointing altar boy Jacob Penn Cooper Hurwitz. I kneel at your religious feet to seek atonement. In college I began a campaign with a problem DM who will be called Jake for legal reasons. Jake restricted characters choices and insisted the campaign be “just like Fantasy High”. Jake fudged rolls, changed stats and increased DCs after rolls to fit his “vision”. He dropped NPC voices sentences after introduction then yelled at us PCs for our confusion. Trying to be fun he gave us a bag of unlimited cocaine but took it back within 20 minutes for table jokes. Lastly Jake, the small man he is, skipped PCs turns intentionally and targeted/killed the only first time player, who was my girlfriend at the time. Just like the Iraq War, I couldn’t let the terrorists win so I began my plot to overthrow Jake and install myself as DM. I spread vicious rumors to anyone who would listen and orchestrated fights between Jake and other PCs. Eventually I had the police handle that thug. Under my reign as DM my PCs and I have been on many unforgettable adventures and continue to this day. The joy we share is the real magic if you ask me. I do not regret my actions but my reason for the coup, also like the Iraq War there were ulterior motives. In reality I was content to let the weaker players suffer, Jake recognized my genius as a role player and rightly made me the main character. I used the campaign to bang hot NPCs and live out my weird sex fantasies, it was cash. It was all ruined one evening when I was brushing my teeth. Jake walked into the communal dorm bathroom stall barefoot. For several minutes Jake loudly farted, grunted and shitted, he then left without washing his hands. Seeing Jake’s disgusting true form I could no longer role play my weird sex fantasies at his table. The Jakey Revolution was not righteous upheaval but vengeance for a ruined goon. Is this sin too great to be forgiven or are we totally chill?

The case of the Terrible Teens' Troubled Tale Your most magnanimous justices, and also the Bailiff Joker I guess, I bring forth a case that still haunts me months later. At a monthly TTRPG game night, one of the GMs presented a game they had made and were playtesting, and introduced the adventure with the comment that we "might be fighting some teens". I joined this group, eager to try this new game, and ended up making a character named St. Nostrum (from the Latin phrase "mare nostrum", meaning "our sea", the joke being that he chose the wrong word when trying to name himself after the ocean) who is from a community that lives on a massive raft in the middle of the sea, worshipping the ocean. As St. Nostrum frequently affirmed, this was NOT a cult, thank you very much, just an extremely tight knit religious order that self exiled into the ocean so normies wouldn't bother them. The first belief in this little religion was "do whatever you want forever", with the understanding that you take responsibility for said actions and deal with the consequences. Which meant, naturally, that when him and his group of acquaintices were threatened by a couple teens with knives in a bar, St. Nostrum, unlike the rest of the party, had no reservations about swinging his sword at these teens since, of course, they had done whatever they wanted forever and would have to deal with the consequences- despite the fact that we were outright told that these teens are living in the slums, likely without anyone to care about them, which meant that they were just trying to survive in an incredibly harsh world. I downed a child (with the flat of my blade, non-lethal) in the name of the ocean and anarchy. There was laughter at the table, but after my attack on a kid, the rest of the party proceeded to instead intimidate the teens into running away. We moved on, but I am haunted by this decision of mine, one I justified in the moment with a "its what my character would do"- Judges, I am a substitute teacher, and currently getting my MA to be a high school theatre teacher, and I now frequently think about this choice when facing my students. On top of that, at the end of that game, the GM had collected our phone numbers so that she could contact us about playtesting in the future but I have yet to hear back from her. Its been nearly two months now without a peep, and I'm worried my teen attack has dissuaded her from wanting to play with me. Judges, was I wrong in my attack on the teens? Should I have tried to talk to the teens first like the rest of my party? Or was I right to stick to what my fictional character would do in this situation? I await your judgement with bated breath.

Sad Trombone 2 - Evil Tanja v. Inattentive Party Members Greetings most honorable, magnificent justices of the supreme crit. Hi bailiff Jonk. I previously submitted a case regarding my DM playing a sad trombone sound on the discord soundboard after a heartfelt moment from a PC in our pathfinder game, Nightingale, that robbed Nightingale of his character moment. Our DM had made it up to Nightingale over the course of the campaign through a mixture of more heartfelt backstory moments, touching and powerful interactions with NPC’s, and fun homebrew power ups. This case is not about Nightingale or even our DM but unfortunately the accursed discord soundboard is semi involved. I play a strong willed snow lynx beastkin ranger named Tanja who has a very well defined moral code that she follows both in and out of combat. Some examples of this include being honest to a fault, believing wholeheartedly that she can overcome any obstacle by taking it head on, never attacking an enemy from behind, and ensuring that anybody who she kills in battle receives a quick, honorable death. While our party was exploring a floating wizard’s tower, Tanja stumbled upon a room with nothing but a mirror and signs of a struggle on the floor and walls. I was taken to a separate one on one call with our DM, and Tanja’s reflection started talking to her combatively. Tanja was then possessed by the evil spirit in the mirror who wiped her memory of the interaction before we rejoined the call with the rest of the party. Mechanically, Tanja now acts as the host for this spirit and on specific story beats Tanja shifts between her normal self and this separate entity who my DM and I are referring to as “Evil Tanja”. While Evil Tanja is in the driver’s seat I have to act in direct opposition to Tanja’s moral code and when she shifts back to normal Tanja has a foggy memory of what happened while she was shifted. This happened almost a year ago and none of the other players have caught on whatsoever. In an entire year’s worth of sessions since, nobody in the party has picked up on the fact that for certain stretches of time I will take actions that directly oppose Tanja’s extremely defined code. My DM and I have even made jokes about how actions like flanking an enemy to attack from behind, giving an enemy a slow and torturous death, or coming up with a deceitful plan are extremely in character for Tanja and things she would always do. As Evil Tanja I have suggested the party take measures that would directly oppose Tanja’s primary goal in the campaign. We have even commissioned separate character art for Evil Tanja to use for Tanja’s token while she is possessed. To tie things back to the sad trombone, the way my DM signals to switch between Tanja and Evil Tanja is by playing a foreboding piano riff on the accursed discord soundboard. This sound is only ever used to signal the shift, yet nobody has questioned it. It has gotten to the point where I will purposely be as on the nose as possible about playing out of character because it is truly funny how nobody notices. Am I being to harsh on my fellow players and do we need to be more explicit to help the party catch on to a PC being possessed by an evil spirit or is the rest of the table being truly inattentive? Is it possible or even likely that the other players have noticed, but just think that it would be a faux pas to call me out on playing my character “incorrectly”? I humbly await your verdict and am ready to accept or issue any punishment that the supreme crit hands out.

Judges and Jacobs, I present the case of strahd. Or, at least the case of wanting to play curse of strahd! I just finished DMing a year long campaign for a group of five friends I have known since high school, this was our first communal experience playing DND(all well into our 30s now). The first campaign wrapped up in a hurry as my wife(also in the party) and I just had a baby boy named Pawpaw around the hoglidays. Everyone wants to keep playing, but of course our parental duties come first.. My wife volunteered to sit out the next campaign while I maintain DM roles(she was adamant I kept playing FYI, she’s glad I’m staying connected with this friend group).. As we discussed our options for next campaign, I mentioned I would really like to run curse of strahd since I recently bought the book, have been loving trinnyvale x barovia, and generally know it is well regarded as one of the best source books. My goal was to run a module since last campaign was homebrew which became a huge time sink, as a father I want to spend that time with my little pawpaw**. Another party member was adamant that we wait until my wife can come back, so we can experience barovia for the first time altogether. While I find the notion quite sweet, I have my sights set on becoming the undisputed burgermaster of the world!! I await your firm, forceful and frisky judgement. Note: All of this is in super good faith, there is no real drama I love my party but just want to get some input from some folks going through strahd right now.. The new parent angle helps too. **No, Paw Paw is not his real name

📜✍️ To the pristine judges and the pouty bailiff Jork— Bit of a personal one here! I was getting more into practicing improv and D&D two years ago and really loved it immediately, so I joined the first improv team I could! Which turned out to be led by a real sexist asshole. We performed a bunch together but never got along, so eventually shit hit the fan and he called to kick me out over the phone with no warning (although I did see the writing on the wall for sure, as he had been undercutting me at practice for months.) I felt weirdly really hurt about how underhanded it was, and never wanted to see his face again—so I permanently stopped showing up to the only improv theater in Cleveland. Alas, it’s been hard to schedule friends for improv games ever since and I’m starting to consider going back. How do you guys think I should handle it? I really loved all my other teammates, but part of the pain was just how sycophantic a lot of people were towards him. People all thought he was sweet underneath, even when he would do things like make me sit through a shaggy dog rape joke or constantly berate everyone. Should I take the leap and get back into it? Should I find better ways to get my friends to actually show up to D&D? I patiently await your judicial opinion. 😊

NOTE: I have a longer version at the end in case you want extra context. To the three Supreme Crit Justices whom are taking Marie Kondo's advice and are using their New Year's resolution to get rid of things that don't spark joy, like Jake, I present to you the case of the Crystal (in the) Skull: I DM'd for a group of five, including a paladin and a bard. While in town the bard split from the party and eventually got ambushed by mooks and goons. Instead of going quietly, she decided to cast Thunderwave. The sound alerted the paladin. When the paladin arrived, the bard was at 0 HP. The paladin was told to put their weapon down. The paladin said no; I had the bard to roll a death save: failure. The paladin was told the bard could be saved if she complied. The paladin refused; cue the second death save fail. Now the bard, and me, are panicking. I then plead/reasoned with the player/paladin that the bard was close to death and they just need to surrender. The paladin adamantly refused. Cue third death save fail. Thinking of the most random BS I could, I had the cult leader take a soul stone, which didn't exist previously, and jammed it into the bard's forehead, r but cursed to do the cult's bidding or it would inflict compounding damage. Justices, I ask of you: did I go against Dice Christ by bringing the bard back from the dead? Which is a bigger buzz kill: allowing DM resurrection to remove the stakes from future sessions or letting a player character permanently die because of a stubborn party member? I am at your mercy. ***start of Longer version*** I DM'd for a group of five, including a paladin and a bard. The party was gathering info in town about the Evil Cult ™. The cult caught wind and sent a tail by the Thieves Guild. The bard decided to split off from the group. Eventually the bard was surrounded in an alleyway by a bunch of mooks and goons. Instead of going quietly, she decided to cast Thunderwave. The sound alerted the party and the paladin with her steed was the first to arrive. When the paladin arrived, the bard was at 0 HP. The paladin was told to put their weapon down. The paladin said no; I hard the bard to roll a death save: failure. The paladin was told the bard could be saved if she complied. The paladin refused; the bard rolls a second death save and she failed. Now the bard's, and me, are panicking. I then had to partly plead with the player and partly reason with the paladin that the bard is very close to death and they just need to surrender and the bard will be spared. The paladin, seemingly dedicated to their oath to never surrender (but not to save people who are dying), once again adamantly refused. The bard then failed their third death save roll in a row. Thinking of the most random BS I could, I had the bandits take the bard to the cult's lair. The cult leader then took a soul stone (think World of Warcraft), which absolutely did not exist an hour earlier, and jammed it into the bard's forehead, bringing the bard back to life but cursed to do the cult's bidding or it would inflict compounding damage. Justices, I ask of you: did I go against Dice Christ by bringing the bard back from the dead? While she was the one who ran off alone and started a fight, she didn't choose to bleed out and she opted not to metagame by telling the paladin's player what to do. Which is a bigger buzz kill: allowing DM resurrection to remove the stakes from future sessions or letting a player character permanently die because of a stubborn party member? I am at your mercy. ***end of Longer version*** Also, if you want follow-up about how a different party member killed the same bard later, let me know.

Hello Judges! And the honorable bailiff Amir! I present the Case of the Murdered Sister and the Paralyzed Cleric. I am usually the DM for our crew of over 7 years, but this adventure was DMed by my friend Spencer. A wacky adventure in Ebberon I played a Werewolf Cleric of the Silver Flame looking for a cure to his lycanthropy and alcoholism. Finally finding some long estranged family, my character watched helplessly as my sister was disintegrated by a lich. I was paralyzed in that encounter. By the liches ability, only after did I find out members of the party had counterspell and didn’t use it because she was an NPC and not worth using a reaction in the fight. The next fight I was PARALYZED AGAIN as a haste spell was cast on me by a party member and they cast another concentration spell, leaving me without a turn. Judges, is my beef with my party members who left their usual DM with a dead sister, or the temporary DM who caused my words??? Please advise.

May it please the court and tickle the lowly lowly lowly lowly lowly acquaintance of Tucker: SURPRISE ROUND. The Grinch has received Face Off technology and looks identical to one of your long-time DnD friends (and Jake) who you host a wildly successful podcast with. You have a live show in Carnegie Hall in 15 minutes and just found out one of your other cast-mates might be the Grinch in disguise. You can only ask one question to each other, what will you ask to find out which of your friends (and Jake) is the Grinch? You have zero bars.

To the wise, patient, and long-suffering Justices of the Court of Tabletop Conduct, and to the bailiff who keeps trying to eat the dice (JAKE DROP IT), I bring before you my case.. I was part of a weekly DND group on Discord with several of my close high school friends. The Dungeon Master, however, was someone I had never been close with, though some of the other players were. From early on, the tone was set. Any time I attempted roleplay or tried to use my character’s abilities to engage with the world, I was met not with collaboration, but with snide remarks and condescension, as if I were an inconvenience rather than a player. For context, I was playing a wizard with the Scholar background. Naturally, I tried to lean into that. At one point, we encountered a church, and I asked to roll to see if my character knew its history. The DM responded with, “How would your character know that?” I explained that my wizard spent his early days in Candlekeep, surrounded by books and learning. The response was that Candlekeep would not have books about this church, and then the scene moved on, shutting down the attempt entirely. No roll. No discussion. Just dismissal. This pattern continued until it finally boiled over during a fight with a basilisk. Repeatedly, the DM asked if we were opening our eyes to attack. None of us wanted to, since both myself and another player had already lost previous characters to petrification in this same campaign. Despite this, the DM kept pushing, saying things like, “Come on, it’s only a DC 15 Con save to not be petrified.” Then one of his NPCs entered the fight and, conveniently, did not open their eyes. I echoed his own logic back to him, pointing out the double standard. At that point, he snapped. He said, “Do you want me to kick you out of the game? I’m not going to take shit from someone who is always late.” Here is the relevant context the court should consider. I have one-year-old twins. I consistently joined sessions about thirty minutes late because I was helping my wife put them to bed. This was not a secret. This was not laziness. This was parenting. After that comment, I hung up, left the call, and exited the game entirely. I have not spoken to the DM since. The other players were shocked by how he spoke to me and agreed it crossed a line. Now, the matter before the court. My friends have told me the DM plans to message me. I miss playing with them, but I do not miss being talked down to or treated like an idiot for engaging with the game in good faith. Justices, I ask for your ruling. Should I swallow my pride and tolerate a DM I do not respect in order to keep playing with my friends? Or should I seek another way to enjoy the hobby, even if it means stepping away from this table entirely? I submit myself to your judgment and await your verdict.

Case pertains to Miles WM, who is freeriding on his mothers patreon account. To the lowly lowly justices Murp, Emp and Crodwel and the god king of the courtroom Jake Hurwitz, may I present the case of Bobo Shits the Gnomish Clown Fighter. I, in my fatigue of being the forever DM, gladly joined a campaign with some friends from college, and due to being exhausted from telling narratives, became a very chaotic, bit-focused player. The other players were a fan of the bits, the GM managed, but it was VERY disruptive. This is important context, for what follows. Due to the improvisational nature of the character’s dynamics, and some narrative response to my bits, I ended up in a scenario where I was Volen-Told Bobo Shits was gay. Adhering to the yes-and principle, I did not push back but it did make me a bit uncomfortable, and I kept with it because I had inflicted bits to others(though the bits were not of a sexual or gender nature) and it seemed fair that they should inflict bits to me in turn. I didn’t want to tell others off as I was just receiving a taste of my own medicine, so I resolved to kill Bobo Shits off in a very stupid way. I did so, and killed Bobo Shits by having him stick his arm in a trap aperture, because it goes in the square hole. Much to my surprise, the other players were actually disappointed about the death of Bobo Shits, and were upset with me for killing him off. The GM was also, surprisingly, far less relieved than I thought he would be, and largely neutral on the action. I am bamboozled as to why they felt this way. To Lord Bailiff and the other ones (I think they’re called Juicestices?), was I in the wrong to kill off Bobo Shits?

I seek the blessings of the high priests of Dice Christ, peace be upon His rolls. Years ago, I began a long-running campaign with a diabolical rakshasa as the big bad. Unfortunately, that table broke up when two brothers at the table discussed D&D with their Southern Baptist pastor and decided it did not align with Diceless Christ's designs. This was the first of three tables that broke up right as they entered the end-game playing in the same shared world against this same rakshasa. One fell apart when a player moved, and another collapsed when two players got divorced. All three tables seemed to be having fun, and most of the players complemented my DMing. One even said it was his favorite campaign ever, but they all fell apart. At a party last week, a collection of my friends were talking about their disparate adventures across the same shared world when they asked me if I would run a two-or-three session mini-campaign to wrap it all up. Your Dicely Graces, please lay upon me the blessings of Dice Christ that I might wrap up a story that's been kicking around my head for a decade.

I come to the church for a wretched, Stradh related, confession. I was soft and let my save an NPC that was supposed to die. I had it all planned out. The death. The after math. Why he was meant to die. This is referring to the angel in the abbey but…They made such a damn good argument to him and tried their damnest to save them that I FAILED at being a cold hearted dm… They now have him in their party. I throw myself at your feet and beg forgiveness and for my heart to be ripped from my chest

Dear honorable (and a bit delicious) judges and the no-good bailiff that ruled against me in the Bug Blender case (keep on stepping, buddy), I bring before thee the case of the Shadow Mastiff Massacre. Long ago, I played a fire-hating goliath barbarian in a homebrew campaign DMed by a good friend of mine. I was joined by a sly, smooth-talking warlock and a pyromaniac artificer. We were level 5. We were investigating a house in a big city and discovered a trapdoor in the bottom of the chimney, leading into darkness. We descended, and were informed we had entered a multi-level dungeon of the DM's making. Excited, we proceeded down a corridor, and came upon the first room. After carefully peering inside and seeing nothing, I said, "I step into the room." The DM said I was immediately surrounded by 4 shadow mastiffs that I hadn't seen, and narrated that I was in the center of the room, not just inside the door like I intended, which would have offered a safe retreat. I proceeded to get mauled by the shadow mastiffs, and then, on the warlock's turn, he elected to cast Burning Hands on myself, a fire-hating goliath, and the shadow mastiffs, downing me. From there, the mastiffs proceeded to TPK us all, the DM laughed while narrating our demise to 'Country Roads Take me Home', and then appeared a little sad that we died in only the first room of his huge dungeon. Judges, I implore thee, does "I step in" mean I go straight to the center of the room? Should the DM have thrown a deadly encounter right at us in the first room of the dungeon, laugh as we get TPKed, then be sad that he didn't get to use his dungeon? And can we talk about the friendly fire killing my fire-hating goliath? I throw this case to the wisdom of the judges.

To the wise, honorable, and all around cool Justices, and the intern who makes the coffee runs (I will take an iced latte), I bring to you the case of Barovian Betrayal. I was invited to play a modified Curse of Strahd campaign with two of my friends, and two people they knew but I did not, DMed by one of the people I didn’t know, with the other stranger playing a Rogue named CC. At dinner with Strahd, it was revealed that Strahd was directly responsible for my sorcerer’s family’s wild magic curse, as well as the death of our Druid’s tribe (and cause of their lycanthropy) and kidnapping the bard’s husband, as well as many other awful things involving Ireena and the townsfolk not normally in the module. Later in the campaign, Strahd invites us to join him and claims that he’s not all that bad, he has his reasons. Me, the bard and Druid all say hell no, except CC agrees and says that she feels betrayed by us when we still refuse. Strahd gears up to attack. The three of us run. I was a bit miffed by this but thought it could be an interesting direction for a campaign to have a party Betrayal, and figured CC’s player would maybe roll a new character or there’d be a redemption arc or something. No. In the discord after session, CC’s player again says (out of character) that she feels betrayed and the DM agrees with her, seeming upset and saying we don’t have a good reason to go against Strahd and CC! I try to say he’s a bad person that did awful things and instead of responding, the DM deletes the discord. I haven’t spoken to either of them since. Justices, did I wrongfully betray a party member or ruin my DM’s plans for no reason? This wasn’t advertised as a villains campaign to me and the guy cursed my family and tortures townsfolk! That feels like it should be reason enough! I accept whatever fate you deem just.

If it please the court, to the venerable supreme crit justices Murphy, Axford, Tanner and valiant balif Hurwitz I lay myself before the mercy of your judgement. In a dnd game for a side quest our dm did a horror style mission with a creepy ghost girl in a haunted house but made it so there was no magic inside the house, which we were locked inside for the whole session (I'm a warlock, my partner is a druid, and we also have a paladin and a fighter in the party as well). We went along with it without complaint and the ghost ended up not being super hard to defeat but after the session we both felt this was a misstep. Next session the dm said they would never do this for the main story and only for a side mission but I think this takes away player agency and discourages us pursuing side quests. Is this reasonable for a dm to do? P.S. Also the dm has remarked multiple times that they struggle to balance combat because we are level 14 but they keep extending the campaign. As a fellow dm I understand that balancing combat at that high level can take a lot of research but I think we (at least my partner and I) would rather just end the campaign and play at lower levels than have magic taken away but they keep extending the campaign.

To the sexy judges and the pretty but approachable bailiff, I submit the case of the final session backstab. I recently played my farewell session before moving as a fey ranger in my friend’s campaign. One of our friends had her last session right before and ascended to the fey high court. I let him know that my character had a full life and was open to whatever closure he saw fit, including death. He said cool and the only campaign related communication I had from him before our session was him sending me a Titania (my ex’s) stat block. The session was interesting; instead of planning with me he had a devil we opposed, mammon, sign an in real life multi-page contract with another player assuring my death in exchange for several boons. I later found out that they negotiated outside the table for several hours. This player was evil in a good aligned campaign but right before our mission I tried to reconcile, show trust, and even gave him my custom bow, the queensguard. I survived but all I could do during the session was encourage my teammates to let me die so they could escape hell. I feel duped and like the session ended anticlimactically. Am I overreacting and not appreciating my amazing dm’s efforts or should I have been involved differently?

To the venerable justices and-holy shit! Is that JORK HORSESHIT?? Sorry, got distracted. ANYWAYS! I bring to you a case that has been making waves in the lower courts for some time now. That being The Case of The Comedian's Cock-Up The current character I’m playing with my longest running DND group is Cub Funny, a racey, freshly canceled comedian and who is, mechanically specking, a Satyr College of Eloquence Bard. He is, to put it nicely, an asshole and a problem. ESPECIALLY for our DM. Our story starts with our party’s battle against a giant and three griffons hoping to capture Cub and take him somewhere; presumably to be charged for his crimes of being a little shit. But when it finally came to my turn in initiative, I get what I think is a pretty clever idea. I decide to use Universal Speech (an Eloquence feature that allows me to be completely understood by a certain number of creatures per long rest) and attempt to trick the griffons into thinking that I am not Cub Funny and that they have the wrong Satyr. This, for some reason, made no sense to the DM. He claims that griffons don’t have the brains to comprehend the concept of the “These are not the droids you are looking for” gambit, regardless of whether or not they can understand me. This lead to a heated, but ultimately respectful, argument amongst the entire group that ended with the DM slightly caving and making me roll an Animal Handling check to convince the griffons; a check that would end up being a NAT 20. With that, we bring the case to you. And all I ask The Justices of The Supreme Crit is that you remember when making your final ruling that this a case of Player vs DM and not a case of Cub Funny vs The Woke Mob

To the supreme crit justices , Murphe, Axford and tanner. also a not so honerable mention to the lowly ballif herwitz. I call on the wisdom of the courts to settle the case of the thunderwave snooze. During our long home game my players have always had a problem with an old ruling I had. The party Had to venture into the frigid north to find the hidden capital of the Deephome dwarves. The party had to brave a blizzard suffering damage from fights and exhaustion from the extreme cold. After finding a cave to rest in, they were ambushed while long resting and a sleep spell was cast on the weakened party. While they were asleep a valuable item was stolen and a fight broke out. During the course of the fight a thunderwave spell was cast next to the magically sleeping rogue. Here lies the problem that has been argued about for years. I ruled that since she was not damaged by the thunderwave she could not wake up from her magical sleep while the party argues that the noise produced by the spell should have roused her. Judges was I wrong for letting sleeping rogues lie or should the razzing continue. I throw myself at the mercy of the court.

To the Salty justice Murphy, Sweet justice Axford, Umami justice Tanner and the buffet of a Bailiff —Jam Hardwitz— I present to you the Fiasco Food Fingerer. Last semester of college I had my first ever D&D session with a mix of PC’s and experience levels where I played a Grung monk named Tofu. We played and ate out of the selection of finger foods, cookies, popcorn, and chips that we’d all been strictly eating straight out of the bowls from. Midway through the session I noticed a gut wrenching, plague filled cough of phlegm and disease across the table from me. In horror I look across to see the DM’s best friend and our party’s cleric coughing straight into her hand and directly putting it into one of the bowls to continue eating. Yeah. I got intensely ill right afterward. Since the session where I mentally clawed my tongue out I’ve been starting to drift away from the party even though they are the only people I know who play the game and invited me. I’ve attempted to try to perform a mini coup and perhaps play games without the player while she was away at a different school but every other party member seems to be really close to her despite the lack of table manners and common outbursts that derail us from the game so hard as to cause us to do one sessions worth of work in three sessions. So my dear pastry chefs was it okay that I ghosted them and have been afk to the discord without saying anything because I didn’t want to hurt their feelings, or should I have said something to convey that I didn’t enjoy playing along a single person of their group that caused me to leave? Ps: After I’d noticed she coughed again I elbowed the other new player next to me and he gave me a solemn nod with pity filled eyes. He and everyone else had noticed before I did and didn’t say anything. I was the only one who got sick. PPS: Hate the show but love the bits so whatever. lol.

To the all knowing judges and that breathing expert guy. I bring to you all the case of "The off day TPK ". I'm part of a long running campaign with a group of dads. During one session, most of the group had to cancel last minute. leaving only me, the Grung fighter, and our Warforged monk. The Dm told us he would go ahead and let us scout out the dungeon ahead of us. All went well till at the end of the session with only a few minutes left, we made it to the last room filled with giant statues (obviously the final fight). Feeling pretty goofy at the time I raised my sword and taunted the statues, thinking that we would just end the session there. To my surprise the DM told us to roll initiative. We both roll low, and the statues come to life and act first, the DM crits... twice... doing a total of 140 damage. We are level 6, so we both die instantly, with no option to react. I fell to the floor in a laughing fit but the monk player seemed really upset. The session ended with our deaths but the air afterwards was a bit tense as we packed up. It all worked out in the end and the monk player got to revive his character through a separate adventure. But I ask the judges : was the DM right to let us start the big final battle with just two people knowing it would just kill us? Or was he right to punish my hubris?

Greetings Supreme Crit Justices and Esteemed Bailiff Blake, today I wish to bring to your attention the case of the chumps who got gud and all played the same character. I've been playing TTRPG's with a long time group of friends and a couple years ago we started playing a new campaign using Fabula Ultima. You don't need to know much about the system for this case besides the fact that all of us were new to the system except for our GM. Us 4 players all picked classes and made characters who looked cool but didn't put much thought into combat viability. This would later come to bite us when our GM ran a "standard combat" and we got absolutely whomped. Just utterly destroyed. When you lose combat in fabula Ultima, you thankfully don't lose your characters, but bad things are added to your sheet for RP purposes. This would end up setting the tone for the rest of the game, our team being labeled unreliable compared to the rest of our guild and fundamentally changed the trajectory of the story. We did get better as players but even as the game went on, we had an about 65% win rate against any given combat. When we asked our GM about making fights easier, they were sympathetic but, in the end, told us that most combats we fought would be considered normal difficulty by the book and if we wanted to win, we needed to get better at the game. So we did. Over a few weeks us players got together to share build ideas and I went as far as joining the official Fabula Ultima discord to chat with people about what was considered broken and what class builds were meta. This research culminated in us finding a build that was just better than anything else we could do. There were some small variations per character but in combat we would all effectively be taking the same actions turn after turn. Our GM, true to their word, they let us play these broken characters to show how gud we got but combat went from thrilling to absolutely boring. There were no real close calls outside of RP and we won every encounter. After this the game would start leaning away from combat and more towards RP because it became even less fun to run combats than before. So, I humbly prostrate myself before you Justices. Should our GM have made fights easier from the beginning, did we as players fly too close to the sun with our broken build and reap the consequences of our actions, or should we have just taken our lumps and let the bad guys beat us sometimes. I humbly await your decision.

To the most esteemed and revered supreme crit justices, and the…. cake guy? i think? I come to you pleading for your judgement. I play in a campaign set in an ancient greece that was destroyed in an apocalyptic fight between the pantheons. our characters, in a hangover-esque turn of events, lost a week of our time, waking up to find our faces on wanted posters, as well as one of our DM PCs, Gosling (No relation to Ryan), an 11 year old girl missing. Disguising ourselves, we went to get information from the man who put out the bounties. My character cast Detect Thoughts, using their Metamagic Adept feat for Subtle Spell, so that they could get information without the man knowing magic was cast at all. We asked leading questions while the spell was active to try and gleam information about our party members whereabouts, but the man’s surface thoughts were completely unrelated to anything being asked, instead just thinking about what he was going to have for lunch and the weather. The following session, our DM told us that he was changing the rules of Detect Thoughts so that you need to do a saving throw for the surface thoughts, and then another saving throw to probe deeper. I protested a bit, but accepted the rules and moved on. This isn’t the first time there has been a disputed spell change to make them worse in this campaign, and dear justices, i doubt it will be the last. So judges, I bring it to you - is detect thoughts TRULY overpowered? Were my DMs changes unfair to the squishy caster of the party, or do you agree with the changes made? I throw myself at the mercy of the court. Critspeed noble justices.

To the abhorrently honorable Justices and Tuckers boyfriend-in-law, I present the case of the hamstringed ranger I was the usual DM for a table of highschool and work friends that gathered twice monthly for sessions. Another player at the table, let's call him Jake, purchased Curse of Strahd and was excited to try his hand at DMing. I was excited for the chance to be a player and created my character - a human ranger named Mason VonHammerfuck. A boisterous and overconfident young man from a rich family of sailors who claimed to have been a successful and effective monster hunter (untrue as we started as level 2's). The issue arose a couple sessions in while on our way to the Wizards of Wine vineyard. I rolled a nat 1 while attacking a vineblight on our way into the property. The DM (Jake we'll call him) narrated that with my nat 1 I had broken the string on my bow. I had no issue with this, as there is a table rule of nat 1s resulting in a negative result such as losing an attack, injuring yourself or an ally or giving enemies an opening and allowing advantage on attacks against you. My grievance is that once combat had concluded I asked if I could take a moment to repair my bow. The DM (Jake) said no. I asked if I could do so if we committed to a short rest. It was at this point that the DM informed me that I would not be able to repair my own bow and would need to wait until I was back in town for someone to repair it for me. My ranger then spent the next two sessions with no bow. Justices, Tucker Jr., am I wrong to assume my ranger would know how to repair his own bow string? Does a single nat 1 in combat warrant two sessions without a primary weapon? I never argued as it was his first campaign and for unrelated reasons the table disbanded and we never made it out of the vineyard but I still hold this salt in my heart. Was my DM strung out or is my case hanging by a thread? I lay this case at your feet and await vindication and/or a violent croissanting.

To the Effervescent Justices and the less-than-average bailiff, The players I DM for murdered an NPC in what I consider to cold-blood. They didn't trust him and later said it was because he didn't have a funny voice and therefore wasn't likely going to be a recurring friend of the party. Justices! Does an NPC having a bland voice indicate that they are untrustworthy or meant to be a one and done character???? (P.S. as a DM I often do use funny voices for many characters good and bad, just kind of forgot to with this one) From the Poo Poo Bandits in Portland

To the mostly fine supreme justices, the really swell Baliff, and the lowly Byron Smurfy, I place the fate of my miserly DM at your feet. My d&d group all found each other online years ago, and now meet up in person yearly. So we sort of like eachother. However, our DM has continued a trend of stinginess throughout that time. It all started when he had us help a now-dead wizard’s illusory simulacrum become real, by finishing the wizards illusion-made real machine. Our wizard and artificer were successful, but tested it (as you should) with an illusion of a pile of platinum bars. Some 500k gold. Anyway, we head to town when dm says “by the way, it’s slowly fading with a half life of 10 minutes. The wizard is fine though”. Then a random, comical devil pops out and stops us for a bit before vanishing. Then we finally get to the town bank, make a deal with the teller to launder money- but the devil shows up, drags her into the vault portal, and seals it. To this day, the bank is still “investigating”. In game and real world years later. Are we wrong for wanting our money? We were in the Icewind Dale. The money wouldn’t have really done much. Thanks Jake!

Long time parishoner, First time confessee. I beseech Dice Christ, the rolly Trini-three and that guy that lives on the grounds to hear my sins. Back in my college days I played in a homebrew Greyhawk game. This was my first major campaign and I played a piece of shit goblin who loved money named Yam. For the most part I rolled honestly but when it came to gambling in-game I slyly fudged the numbers. I'd done this for nearly a year until the DM called me out when he asked, "OK but what did you really roll?" I was mortified but everyone had a nice laugh. I've been since lightheartedly branded as a cheater in my group and they reasoned that it was in the spirit of my character. Since then I rolled truthfully but honestly I've always felt incredibly guilty about doing this nearly 14 years later and only did so cause I wanted I didn't want my first character to be a broke loser. I throw myself at the mercy of the pulpit and beg for forgiveness.

My most Scrumptious Judges, Biryani, LemonTea, Cole-Slaw and the believeably edible baliff Jambalaya. I bring forth to you the Case of the Sandbox. I'm a long time player and DM, and after doing curse of strahs decided on a whim to join a online game with some locals to my area. We play 2-½ hours every 2 weeks, and we've so far had 7 sessions, but only 2 combats and haven't even left town yet. I've talked to the newer DM about pacing and giving the party some more motivation to move forward with plot, and he agreed, but still has run it very open world with little direction. Its not engaging me, so Should I be more patient with the newer DM? Or should I just banana split?

To the revered Judges Axford, Murphy and Tanner and the bailiff Ja... something... I bring you the case of the rushed revival. I am part of a campaign that has been running (on and off) since 2021 and shared the DM duty while our regular DM sorts out some legitimately harrowing life issues. Late 2025 our DM took a 2 month break at a pretty pivotal time in the campaign with a plan to return with an all day session on December 30th when we were all on break. The issue is that our DM had just surprised us with what we thought was a stronghold of bloodthirsty raiders was actually a chill pirate city built into the side of a calderra with a 5 strata'd society based on honor and merit. We loved it, and spent multiple sessions building a home and earning out way to the second ring of the city and ended session right before we saw the second ring and right after one of the players betrayed the other in the advancement games (wild shape shenanigans). Come the day of the return and it was clear that the DM was not prepared for a session. The second ring felt lifeless and flat, with any interaction requiring us to earn property and the only way to afford the exorbitant rates was to sign a literal slavery contract. Then a major npc (ex PC turned villain) appeared to give us a time sensitive mission and we were out of the city. Justices, we literally made 2 rolls in a 7 hour session. I am excited for whats to come, but am I wrong to feeling that our return to the calderra was taken away from us?

To the beautiful layers of snow left after a storm—Justices Murphy, Axford, and Tanner—and the muddy slush pile that lasts until March—Baliff Joke—I bring to you the case of the cannibalistic Dragonborn. I played a Dragonborn in a Curse of Strahd campaign with my college housemates. Our party also consisted of a Tortle, an Assimar, and a gnome. We were introduced to the dream pastries, which my DM modeled after mandymods’s rules. My Dragonborn did not care about the increasing signs telling us it was human meat (only the gnome seemed perturbed). I argued that it was fine, because I’m a Dragonborn, not a human or an elf or something. A dragon would eat a human, and they’re just as intelligent as any humanoid. My fellow players brought up a few good points: one, my character was a paladin, so it’s probably not good to be eating people regardless. Two, we later had another friend join, and he played as one of the kids who was about to be turned into meat. I had to leave the party soon after, but by then I believe I had backed off my pro-meat pie stance. I humbly submit myself to this court to ask the ethics of Dragonborns consuming human meat. I believe Justice Murphy has argued that eating humanoids in general is cannibalism on a case about aarakocra, so I don’t think the tides are in my favor. Still—does the dragon part of my Dragonborn heritage save me from the crime of cannibalism, or am I bound by the chains of my humanoid nature?

To the Golden Gods of the highest council, thy kingdom come, thy crits be done, and Jake, leader of the Animorphs. I bring THE CASE OF THE PRIMATE V SPIDER At age 13, I asked to be in my brother in law's tabletop game with two other (adult) players. It was a magitech setting where our characters were recruited to be apart of a magical syndacit of people who stop evil. My character, Snap Clackers, was a Nature powered monkey who gained his abilities and sentience after being captured and experimented on. Me and the other players got along and played well off of each other and it was shaping up to be a fun campaign. At the end of one of our sessions, the DM (Brother in law) announced excitedly that there would be a guest who would play a villain next session which excited the rest of the table as well. However, me being 13 and getting shit grades on my report card, I was grounded that week and couldn't go to the session. The next session I was filled in by the DM what happened. Apparently, the guest played an evil spider queen who womped the party and demanded they bring her 100 peasants to turn into her spider army. Judges, they agreed to do so. My character, who was present while I the player was not, was made to agree with them. You can see how this would be of big conflict to who my character was and, being new to roleplay, I simply played him dispondant and angry for the rest of the session, going against what the party was trying to do that session. The campaign shortly fizzled out due to other factors outside of anyone's control. Judges, should I have been more malleable with my monkey's morals or was I right to lash out at my party for their decision? (PS. The guest who played the spider queen was my 23 year old sibling. The one who was married to my brother in-law)

To the honorable supreme crit - the comedic heavyweights Justice Assford, SurfNMurph, and Tanney…… and Jake. I bring you the case of falling damage in water and the water walking spell. Where this begins - My wonderful players had an epic battle against mechanical dragon. One player cast water walking on the entire team pre battle. During battle, another one of them decided to mount the dragon because they’re a melee fighter and naturally wanted to get up in the dragons business. Well, the dragon flung him off, and since the battle was on the coast of a lake, he asked if he could aim for the water, to which I (the DM) said sure - make me a Dex check. He succeeded and promptly landed in the water. I ruled that hitting water from 100+ ft would be equivalent to hitting land, but he argued since he had water walking, he should at least take half damage because the spell would attempt to keep him on the surface of the water. Reading the spell, it says “move across any liquid surface as if it were harmless ground”, so I ruled that landing on the water would react like landing on the ground. This player almost died from drowning (he was stunned) but ultimately ended up barely surviving. My table still argues that the water walking should’ve reduced the amount damage he took. Honorable Judges - please settle this one and for all.

To the sweet honourable balif and the cruel and judgemental judges, I bring you a case of the god father moment. I was playing a werebear rouge named joe-sepi, he was one of my first characters, for context i would play him fairly annoying, pulling on npcs clothes and trying to be a little shit, selling painted rocks as "runes" in my travelling carriage I bought from the Gold I got lucky rolling for in a treasure pile (important), and a few caldwell antics in combat, unknown to me this made the party hate joe sepi, so when he finally bought a horse for his carriage and was resting in the carriage, they pulled a god father on him, describing killing it, decapitating it and putting it in his bed, I was shocked, this felt abit too mean so i narrated joe sepi waking up, turning into a bear and leaving with his carriage Justices, was this valid?, I feel as it was a leap from some small antics and goofs P.S, outside the game they were unhappy i "took it too far with him leaving", the dm said it made sense and helped me roll a new char

To the Most Honorable Justices of the NADDPOD High Court, And to Jake the Bailiff, Who Keeps Order with an Iron Gavel and a Fantasy Team He Swears Is “Still in It,” I, a humble and newly anointed Dungeon Master, do hereby present my case of scheduling treachery. I am Dungeon Master to a party of five adventurers, currently four sessions deep into Dragons of Stormwreck Isle, chosen because we are all new to this sacred art and I am DMing for the first time. The dice are learning us. We are learning the rules. The vibes are fragile. Yet two members of my party have fallen under the thrall of a dark and ancient god: Football Sunday. Though the majority of the table is available on Sundays, these two players are routinely spirited away by “games,” “playoffs,” and the general tyranny of televised sports. This has led to scheduling delays, fractured momentum, and one Dungeon Master quietly staring at her prep notes like a wizard whose spell slot was wasted. The question before the Court is thus: May I, as Dungeon Master, issue an ultimatum requiring these players to choose between football and D&D? Or must I toil endlessly to find a time when everyone is available, even (may the gods forgive me) on a weekday night? I beg the Court for judgment, mercy, and possibly a ruling declaring football a concentration spell that can be broken. Humbly submitted, LAB, DM on the Brink of Multiclassing into Scheduling Tyrant

May it please the happenin’ judges and their jive-ass turkey, Jonk. I present to you the case of mediocre AI use at the table. So a little background, I just wrapped up a year long home-brew campaign that I DM’d for a close group of friends and my partner (5 PCs total). Throughout the whole campaign, one of the party members (we will call him Jens) struggled with the role playing aspect of the game. Which is completely understandable, it can be difficult especially if you’re not totally comfortable improvising and being creative in a group setting. So here is where the issue started. In the first level up the party got during the campaign, everyone was excited to share the new skills and perks and when it came around to Jens’ turn to share, he said, “Well, I didn’t really know how to level up my character so I plugged all of the information into Chat GPT and this is what it gave me.” (This was NOT his first campaign) The character sheet LOOKED convincing, but upon further inspection, there were some things that didn’t make sense and some things that were just downright made up. We all razzed him for using Chat GPT for this and I told him to go back to the paper sheet and we can take a look together at it and if he ever had any questions, I am happy to try to answer as well as another PC who has a lot of experience. He told me he had lost it but would find it when he got home. Flash forward 6 months, every level up has been the same. No paper sheet in sight, Jens has been using a clunky app for his character sheet on his phone. He is the only PC using their phone at all for anything during this game too (that’s another issue that we won’t get into right now). No matter how many times I ask him to start a new paper sheet, he does not. I even PROVIDED some fucking SICK CUSTOM CHARACTER SHEETS for the whole party hoping it would incentivize him, but it failed. Needless to say, the whole campaign was a struggle for him and for me to bring his character into the light when he did not know how to play the character or who the character even WAS. 

 FLASH FORWARD TO NOW. I am a PC in a Call of Cthulhu long-form campaign being run by another friend of ours and he is in the party again. I don’t mind so much now that I’m just a PC and I don’t have to navigate this issue head on anymore but I am irked every time I see him pull something from Chat GPT or something like that. Even when we began, our GM told us to imagine what our character looks like. Either draw it, find some pictures online of similar looking characters or people or something like that. Of course, here comes Jens a week later with a fresh steaming pile of AI art of some gumshoe detective who (in my opinion) looks nothing like the character he described (a short, balding, old antique shop owner). SO I ASK YOU. Am I being a hater? Am I being a stick in the mud? Or am I actually playing Call of Cthulhu with Jens Lindell, triplet extraordinaire himself? Sincerely, Chuck Mangione's Horn

To the sweet sour Chief Grinches and to the dog, bailiff Jax: I present the case of the Forced Character Persona. A while back, i was playing a game with some friends. It was our first session, and I brought a fun pirate/cowboy hybrid roguish character who heads a ship of robin hood-esque bandits, named Benny “Lucky Penny” Cricket. I wanted him to be a chaotic good type who was always well meaning, but brash. During the first hour, the party was pickpocketed by a street urchin, and I pursued to get the goods back. I rolled an attack and hit, saying I wanted to stop the boy somehow and hold him. My GM, one of my best friends but admittedly a super new GM, told me because I’d rolled the attack with my knife to-hit bonus, I “cut the kid to ribbons, and he lie bleeding out on the ground.” Not very chaotic good. I protested, but acquiesced to the ruling. Our cleric healed the kid, so no problem. The problem, grinches and dog, is not with the DM ruling, but the fact that for the rest of the time we played the game, my party members labeled me a child killer, and would razz me to no end. It didn’t just stop at razzing though— my party would stop me from interacting with NPCs they thought were young enough to be kids, and even prevented me from going to an important NPC’s house to progress the plot because “i might just end up killing their kid.” I went along with it not to be a buzzkill, but it really got to me at the end. The campaign was short lived, but I think about it to this day. Justices, am I wrong for being so upset that I was branded a child killer for a session 1 encounter that went the opposite of what I wanted? I refer to your sweet sour guidance.

To the judges on Mount Everest and the Bailiff in the Dead Sea, I think his name is “Gawrsh” (hyuck!), I present the case of the “Alchemical Dragon Throat”. I am a brand new DM who has never actually even played DnD (just watch a lot of live play). Typical story, wanted to play but no one would DM so I volunteered as tribute. My table consists of two other newbies, two guys who play often and one who played 25 years ago but not since. My players are on a quest for the pieces of Fraz Urb’luu’s staff. One of their major NPC battles was against a Rouge Alchemist Oorog named Gelrugg who was trying to create a super race of Orcs (as one does) by experimenting with poisons and dragon blood. Half way through battle, Gelrugg used his part of the staff (a staff of command) to bind himself to an adult green dragon. The battle culminated on a narrow walkway over a 500 ft waterfall outside of Ironfang Keep. As they killed the dragon I narrated that his body, once devoid of life, slid off the gangway and plummeted into the water below. One of my seasoned players said he wanted to have taken the esophagus from the dragon. I told him the body would have fallen almost immediately but we could do a series of checks to see if his character (a tiefling sorcerer) could get down to the body fast enough, hold on to the giant adult dragon body as it sank, have enough dexterity to remove the esophagus, swim back up and make it back to the party. In total I proposed 5 checks of varying DC. He gave such resistance to this that I relented and just had him roll a straight up DC 19 luck check which he of course failed. We didn’t dwell on it too long and I gave him a chance to buy one in the next town at a good price but it still bothers me. Was I being “too much”, or was I right to up the stakes and give the attempt some flavor? I humbly await your verdict.

To the honourable servants of Dice Christ (and Jake, I guess) - I humbly seek guidance on a confession that may also be a case. A few sessions into a campaign with a new group, we were tasked with retrieving an essential relic from a dungeon, which the DM rolled for the alignment of. He landed on chaotic good, and explained this meant the relic was in the possession of a group of innocent, good-aligned clerics that we would have to slaughter in order to retrieve it. I objected, saying I was uncomfortable playing out the massacre of innocents - I had not signed up for an evil campaign. The DM shot down my objections. He stressed that we would not be able to continue the game without the relic; that negotiation was not an option; and, when I asked about stealth, that hide DCs would all be above 20. So this is where I must confess, and throw myself at the mercy of Dice Christ and the court - for in my eagerness to avoid a massacre, I cast Pass Without Trace on the group: a spell that I did not have prepared. It worked, and we were able to sneak through the dungeon with minimal casualties and my morality (mostly) in tact - but I cannot help feeling that I sinned against Dice Christ with my lie. Can Dice Christ forgive me for lying about my spells in my desperation to avoid participating in the slaughter of innocents, or must the court punish me for my transgressions? (P.S. - I left the group immediately after that session.)

To the high priests of Dice Christ and their beleaguered altar boy: I come to you seeking absolution not for a sin I committed, but one I believe was committed on my behalf. I got into dnd by playing one-shots at a local game store, always with the same pre-gen bard from the DM. In my last one shot, the party got in way over our heads in an astral casino’s underground fight club - I was the only party member left standing, with just one hit point, and the big baddie’s final attack just barely missed my AC. On my turn, both enemies failed the save for Shatter and took just enough damage to die. Miraculous! Or so I thought. Since then, I’ve moved my bard into a campaign, and I’ve been rolling like dog shit the whole time! A full year! Fathers and Mother, I fear this extremely kind and generous DM may have fudged the numbers to avoid a TPK. Is there anything my sweet bard can do, short of dying, to atone for the well-meaning sin of another?

Howdy Honourable Heros and Hake. I present the case of the Black Dragon Taunt. My usual crew and I were about 10 sessions into a home game when our DM started to dangle a dragon encounter to us. Multiple towns had been attacked by a young black dragon with a broken wing (not Toothless) and as Lvl 5s we weren't quite leveled properly but we figured "Fuck it there's 4 of us. Lets see what our new shit does." (Fighter / Pally / Druid / Sorce). When we got to its lair, our DM described a shallow cave carved out of the base of a marble mountain with a steep ramp into an acid pit before a hallway into the dragons hoard. We didnt want to fuck with that ramp and acid (or its breath weapon indoors) so we lured the dragon out into the clearing. After a long, knock down drag out type fight, everyone was low on hp, including the dragon. When it got to the dragons turn, the DM announced he would be taking its movement then dashing back into the lair. His movement lead him directly into my path, so I asked my DM if I could trade my opportunity attack for a chance to taunt the dragon into attacking me. One successful intimation check later, the dragon then kicked the absolute shit out of me leaving me dead and with 2 failed saves. During the round to follow, my party descended on the dragon, killed it, picked me up and we went on our merry way with a remaining group total HP of 14. Your Honours (and Hake), for years I have been razzed by my party members for being an idiot and getting whomped by a dragon. But alas, was it not my bravery that lead to the beast being slain? Did I not 4D chess my DM into his dragon getting killed? I leave it to the crit to decide if they truly have Razzing Rights or do I finally get the Brave lil Toaster badge I think I deserve. P.S - The most Jersey thing about Murph is that he's into hockey. First time, long time, hate the show.

To the auspicious Justices and the guy who kinda reminds me of my brother - I present the case of the Surprise Surprised Condition. A player in the core group recently started a D&D campaign using 2024 rules to give the forever DM (who runs 2014 rules) a break. One week the new DM had to cancel and the forever DM offered to run a one shot that night. He didn't specify which rule set to use, only saying “Bring a level 13 character and prepare for a wild evening". That rainy night while everyone is getting set up in the basement, the DM says “Oh, I hope you don't mind, I invited another player to help round out the numbers." Just then the doorbell rings upstairs. Since it's your house, you head up and peek outside the front window. Standing at the door is a man in an impeccable Grinch costume. Or, hell, it might even be the Grinch himself. In one hand he has a Player's Handbook and in the other is a cloth sack - roughly the size of a basketball - filled with something lumpy. Both seem to be partially covered in a dark liquid. You begin to head back to ask the forever DM about who he invited when the Grinch starts knocking rather forcefully on the glass. Your phone has zero bars - what do you do?

Dear okay Justices and the vivacious Bailiff. Unrelated to that, most noble Bailiff, please let my family go. I come before you with an update on the Plot Avoiding Players. I leaned into the advice from the court and mentioned to them that it's not always super fun to DM for a party that does nothing. This was received kindly, with my friends giving me more details about what excites them about D&D. I took their ideas and built plot lines around those themes. Things at the table changed; they helped overthrow a monarchy, rescued a missing knight, and travelled to a far-off continent in search of an ancient relic. However, since arriving at the new continent, they have returned to their plot avoiding ways. I have not needed to do new prep for the last four sessions because they have not left the first town they got to. They found the lead on the relic in the town three sessions ago and instead of chasing it down before the bbeg can get to it they have, gone for walks, had a poker night, and spent over an hour of a session in a PvP sparing session. On top of that they got annoyed last session that they didn't level up from their sparing. I plead with the court, we do milestone levelling and have always done level-ups at big plot moments. This is the crux of my case, am I right to withhold a level up until they actually progress the story beyond poker nights and PvP or are my players right that even plot avoiders deserve level ups? P.S. Please Bailiff, my family are good people, I promise I respect you.

Esteemed justices Axford, Tanner, Murphy, and whomever else is in the room - I present the case of the stolen bard. I joined a new campaign with a few friends of friends who are also into dnd. This was the DMs first time DM-ing, and the DMs partners first time playing. We were asked for characters with a lot of backstory, as this was supposed to be a long running campaign in which our backstories would feature heavily. I chose to play a bard, as did several other players in our party, including the DMs partner. At the end of our first session (set at a Tavern) the DM had us roll a con save. I and the DMs partner both failed, and the DM said our characters had both drunk poison given to us by the bartender and died with no death saving throws. I was annoyed and talked to the DM about it after the session - he said that the party had too many bards and for the sake of the game we needed to pick new non-bard characters. This was fine until the next session, when we're introducing our new characters. I introduce my new ranger, and who should the DMs partner introduce but another bard, with the same name and description as my bard who was killed. When asked about this after the session, the DM said that the had let their partner look at all of the backstories for the PCs and they liked mine the best and wanted to play as my character instead and I should "take the compliment" since "writing cool backstories is apparently so easy for me". I left the game after that, but can't help but feeling wronged by the way this was handled.

To the honorable supreme crit justices and the ignoble individual fielding the questions. I have a followup this time as opposed to an actual case. A while back I wrote in that a friend of mine hooked me up with his old group, but didn't tell me that he had quit said group until after I had started playing with them. I had followed the court's advice and stuck it out, and after a while I started to make friends with other people in the group and have even been hanging out with the DM outside of sessions. During one such hangout, I played the DND court case for him. He was... Kind of mortified by his role in it all and apologized profusely. I hadn't meant to put him on blast. I was trying to share the story as something funny that happened that we could all laugh about now that it was over. I was able to assure him that I wasn't upset with him and he seemed to take it in stride. Anyway fast forward to this past month. The same friend sent another of his friends to the group. However, rather than drop this new person into the campaign, the DM set up a group chat for the new player and the others for a new one shot. He told everyone that the goal was to see how everyone gels with each other in a low stakes mini campaign, and even gave inspiration for people who made their characters have linked back stories. It seemed to go well, and the new player has been invited to join the next major campaign that we are gearing up for in a few months.

To the fabulous justices and the fart bailiff I bring the case of the divorced racist tabaxi. I was a player in a wild beyond the witch light campaign and alas my character was killed by one of the hags #hagyear2026. In re-rolling my new character I decided to build someone with strong connections to the three remaining players, a tabaxi ranger, a gnome artificer/cleric, and an orc rouge. The artificer owed my new tabaxi fighter money, the orc belonged to the same thieves guild that took my fighter in when his slave camp was liberated, and of course he had a shared lineage with our ranger. Here’s the catch, the person playing the ranger was very caught up in the lore that tabaxi looked down on all other races and this was getting in the way of them integrating into the party. I wanted my character to have been born in the tabaxi slave camps with little to no connection to the tabaxi homeland culture. Essentially acting as a bridge due to his tabaxi-ness but show our ranger that the cat folk aren’t the be all end all and try to get our ranger to open up a bit. I pitched my character to the group in the same session I was killed and everyone seemed excited except the Ranger who had admittedly been smoking a lot of weed during session so I did not think much of their limited reaction. Turns out, after I left, the ranger ask the DM who was also their husband to tell me I couldn’t play the character I had pitched because the ranger thought I was going to be mean to them. Unfortunately I never got to resolve this situation because the DM and the ranger broke up before our next session and are now divorced. So was I in the wrong for trying to play another tabaxi who would challenge our ranger? Have we all been punished enough already with a messy divorce and break up of our DnD group? I humbly await your decision.

Hello honorable justices and the less honorable but still tolerable bailiff, I bring to you the case of the impossible persuasion check. My friends and I were playing through the Lost Mine of Phandelver. Myself and the DM had played quite a bit, while the rest of the party were brand new. We were still squishy at level two and had come from a pretty rough fight, with most of us still at half HP, when we encountered a band of very strong (compared to us) red cloaks in the town square. These red cloaks are like the town guard/mafia and were threatening us with violence if we did not pay a certain sum of gold, which between all 4 of us we didn’t have. I was playing a swashbuckler rogue and had the highest charisma in the party, so I began bargaining on our behalf. I was doing everything I could to keep us out of a fight. I rolled pretty high on my persuasion check (a 21). The DM then narrates that the red cloaks reject my bargain and for everyone to roll initiative. We made it out alive luckily - but the DM and I still argue about it to this day. He says the red cloaks were not open to hearing my case from the get go because the source book says we have to fight them, and that only a nat 20 would get them to leave us alone. (The DM is also my fiance) Judges, I beg you, who is in the right here? We are in dire need of justice so we might have peace in our home!

May it please the court plus jaaaaake the bailiff, may I produce the case of the accidental villain! Firstly, I should say this was a very casual game, we weren’t expecting anything big, but it did lead to some controversy at the table We were doing a Christmas one shot, trying to uncover who poisoned Santa! We questioned the gnomes running the workshop, the grumpy manager, Rudolph the dragon, a witch who was there for some reason, each other, and were stumped. But after much questioning, and confusion, we discovered that the grumpy manager had stolen a scroll from the witch, and used it to learn how to poison Santas food. Us, the players, were sceptical of this, as we looked for the scrolls in the witches house, and found all of them earlier. After calling the dm out, he simply said “you didn’t remember every single scroll, and must have missed some” (I rolled a 17 investigation to search) Then finally, after killing the manager and reviving Santa, the dm came clean. The villain changed halfway through the oneshot. It was supposed to be the gnomes, but as we had much more fun talking to the manager, the dm wanted to make him the villain, and fumbled trying to make up a new murder mystery on the spot. So I ask you, humble court members and sweet boy who needs his mother to take him home from the football game because it ran late, was our dm foolish for trying to remake a oneshot on the fly, or did we make a few scrooges of ourselves by criticising. (I should add, this is all in good fun, we aren’t actually annoyed, just curious on y’all’s opinion)

May it pleasure the most Supreme of Courts and tickle the bailiff’s fancy until it wets itself… I present the case of the Bullseye Druid! I joined a campaign my partner was in with her friends, who I didn't really know. The DM was running the same module with another group and thought it would be fun for both parties to race to retrieve a special amulet for a town festival. Each group ran separate sessions through an underwater grotto, using potions to breathe. At the start of the joint session the DM made it very clear that no one would be allowed to die from PvP. Our group was not allowed to make stealth rolls even though we ended the previous session having Pass Without Trace up. Our rogue got the amulet off a giant shark and I cast Invisibility on him. The DM's husband in the other group said, "Focus fire the Druid (me) to break concentration" even though his character had no way to speak underwater. Their party of 6 players proceeded to ignore the shark and take me down in one round, though I held concentration and the rest of my party dashed away with the item. We ultimately "won" but I was salty as the sea. Your honors, should we have gotten to make stealth roles against the other players’ perception? Should the DM have stopped the table talk to uphold her "No PvP killing" rule? I await your ruling with potion-baited breath! Supplementary Evidence: Our group was two Rogues and a Barbarian, so I had built my Druid to specialize in stealth. We had used Pass Without Trace to avoid most combat in the previous session and still had plenty of time left on it. The full group session was online with about 10 players, so I really tried to be understanding about how much cat-herding the DM was having to do. We entered the final, large cavern area from opposite sides, where the amulet we were all after was being guarded by the giant shark. The amulet was hanging from a spear stuck into the giant shark. One of our Rogues had the ability Psychic Whispers, which allowed our party to communicate under water. We planned to just grab and dash rather than fight, to avoid unnecessary PvP or animal cruelty. The other group initially fought the shark until our party got the amulet, then ignored it to take me down even while it was still attacking them. I had pointed out that the DM’s husband had no way to speak to his party underwater when he told them to focus on me but they all still acted based on his table talk. Our Barbarian did manage to scoop my unconscious body but it still felt like I got punished for our group trying to honor the spirit of the “no killing” rule.

Esteemed justices Axford, Tanner, Murphy, and Balliff Jess. I bring you the case of the threat of pvp. A few years ago I was several sessions deep into a campaign with some friends. The DM had set a few ground rules, including no PVP. We started off as slaves fighting as gladiators who managed to escape the horrors of the colluseum and hide out in the woods. After scouting the patrols we set an ambush for the militia captain and two island guards. We killed the guards, subdued the captain and bribed him to plot against our former master. But before letting him go our barbarian told him to remove his armor. My character was against this, arguing it'd be better if it seemed like nothing happened to the captain. The other character insisted and moved to remove the armor and I said that my fighter stood between them. The player looked at the DM who shrugged and said, there's no PVP yet. The barbarian backed down but there was definitely some tension from that player during the rest of the session. My question is this, was I out of line to "threaten" PVP and should have taken the conversation out of character? or was the DM right to consider this within the rules?

Dearest justices Axford, Murphy, and Tanner, and little baby boy Baliff Jock, I present to you the case of the Unappreciated Magical Blunderbuss. A few years ago I started DMing for my husband and two of his friends. I was new but very enthusiastic. I create a fully HomeBrewed world based on my PCs characters after giving them the prompt: Wild West Meets Alien Desert Planet. In the very first session I gifted each PC a special home brewed item. One was for a Swashbuckling and Gun-toting Pirate Captain PC; a gnome-made Blunderbuss with an unlimited ammo bag. He would roll a D6 and see the type of damage the ammo did based on the table (radiant, necrotic, poison, etc). He immediately wanted to know how to getting rid of the random factor. But because it was a weapon made by gnome artificer (whom they went on to meet in session two) I told him he would have to take a level in Artificer or Wizard to understand it enough to control at will (it was already overpowered for level 3 PCs). The PC was not happy and kept trying to convince me of other classes, none were intelligence based. Finally I relented and said if he studied enough and added to intelligence it would get there in the future without needing to multiclass (i get not everyone is into that). Judges, was I in the right to set boundaries based on intelligence, which happened to be his dump stat? Or should I have given him an option closer to his character at the beginning? I just wanted a fun random gun he could shoot. I humbly away your verdict.

Benevolent Justices and, *clears throat*, I bring the case of the fireproof satyr. In the 51st session of my soon-to-end homebrew campaign, the party fought imperial snitch wizards on a warship. After one injured mage got pushed into the bay, he Fireball-ed the only PC in sight — my friend Jack’s satyr ranger Tumnus Spanakopita, and his wyvern mount. As a satyr, he gets Magic Resistance, so advantage on saving throws against magic. But does that mean advantage saving against Fireball? The advantage totally makes sense to me for a hold person, flesh2stone or Suggestion, but if a magical AOE drops an ice storm or a fireball on him, why should he get advantage? Jack’s rebuttal: idk i’d def argue it’s magic fire.

To the justices I begrudgingly respect and the illustrious Bailiff Jacob I bring the case of my PC who said “Bye!” I was running a high fantasy game in a home brewed gilded age inspired world this last year. One of my players characters was a magic wielding scam artist named William. During character creation William was described to me as “a piece of shit on a redemption arc” which I was a bit concerned about, but I play with good friends I trust. We had some great character scenes in the first couple sessions where he committed to helping out the group. Fast forward 10 sessions or so my players are escaping Will’s home town after a series of catastrophic failures. They make it out and someone new to the table starts a fire to get to know the other characters. Will says “Bye!” and narrates walking away. The roleplay grinds to a halt. I try to explain if he just leaves he’s going to have to make a new character but he says he doesn’t want to leave! He wants the other players to convince him to stay. We’re all a little confused but one of my players obliges and gives a great speech. Here’s where I need a ruling: I shoot him a message with suggestions on how to get his character more involved. The response was a wall of text. He said he just doesn’t understand the rules as well as we do, he didn’t think he had enough to work with, that it just didn’t make sense for his character to stick around! Apparently he didn’t remember those scenes earlier in the campaign. It was kind of a lot, so I apologized not knowing what else to say. This all really took the wind out of my sails and in conjunction with some scheduling issues I ended the game a couple weeks later. Was it up to me to shine this self described piece of shit? ps there’s another game in the works and he is invloved :0 Oh god brevity oh fuck

Hi Jake, and you black robed Corbies that love to feast on our pain- love your work. Case: Even after expressing that it’s no damn fun to spend several sessions just trudging through the woods to get to the next plot point, our GM just loves his “style of story telling” but I am bored out of my mind. My elf spends his time gambling, talking to his hawk familiar, writing letters to his dwarf fiancé, and generally being miserable. Btw: while traveling we all get exhaustion level and can’t get spells back because we quote “can never get a good nights rest” even after a nat 20 survival to find a place to camp. Please pluck his eyes out oh masters of air and afterlife! -me

Honorable justices and Jake, I present the case of the peeping parents. Years ago I DM’d online for my husband, brother-in-law (27), and brother-in-law’s new girlfriend (25) over Discord and Roll20. My husband and I were the only ones who kept our cameras on which I found awkward but tried to breeze past for the sake of family harmony. However, about an hour into our first session I kept hearing giggling and eventually found out the girlfriend’s parents were watching the whole thing, commenting on the story, and advising their daughter. DMing is so vulnerable to me and I thought we were on a private call! I was so uncomfortable but ended up again not saying anything. The campaign eventually fizzled and they broke up, but am I wrong to hold a grudge about this years later?

Dearest California King judges and dorm room extra long twin jale, I humbly offer the case of the cowboy Kali Ma. I was playing in a cowboy themed one shot where the DM had admittedly made it very clear that death was a possibility, so of course cut to my fellow adventures immediately starting a fight in the starting tavern, while I maintain my innocence in the events that caused the fight, once it was clear that a fight was inevitable I did what any good party member would do and joined it with full commitment. I was immediately shot in the chest and reduced to one HP, I am not mad at all about this as it is something that tends to happen in gunfights. However, a fellow party member than immediately attempted a medicine check to give me some health back, critically failed, to which the dm described them reaching into my open chest cavity, ripping my heart out Indiana Jones style, and crushing it in there fist. My question, is it fair for me to have been killed by someone else's failed medicine check, dispite still being alive and conscious before it was rolled? Or if I'm playing at a high stakes table I need to be prepared for deaths that I may not have ever actually rolled any dice to cause?

Dice Deacons I beseech thee, I am in the midst of a crisis of faith. I am an art teacher who runs an afterschool D&D club for high school students. It has been a source of great joy for me in the past, and the club has grown a fair bit over the last few years. Therein lies my dilemma. I have enough students for 3 distinct adventuring parties, playing on alternating weeks, and eager to play even more if they could. In the past, this is something I would have welcomed- D&D club was the highlight of my week as well, but lately I fear I have lost my spark. Prep feels like a chore, and I know that I am not bringing the best of my DMing abilities to the table for these students. The D&D burnout is real, and I pray the church can help me find my way in my walk with Dice Christ.

To the most gracious justices and the not-bad-once-you-get-to-know-him baliff jonk, I present to you the case of the pet princess killer. Our adventuring party has been traveling to a festival and along the way picked up the local princess, played by our DM. Our paladin was sworn to her service from their backstory, and the rest of us quickly fell in love with her as we traveled. During this process our sorcerer had to take a couple weeks off and decided to play a different character when she returned (which is allowed and encouraged at our table and was worked into the story by the DM). Enter Donna, the halfling bard with a sweet country accent. Or so we thought. Turns out the sorcerer had plotted with the DM and Donna was in fact a disguised assassin from a family of goblins that she had gotten the DM to write into the campaign. This however was not revealed until after we had found her original character, and the princess and Donna had gone missing after being left alone over a long rest. There were a few references to this family brought up, including a canon one-shot about them we did for the sorcerer's birthday, but everyone is still pretty upset about it. So I ask, Justices, were we wrong for trusting our friend not to kill our favorite npc? [[READ AFTER RULING]] (P.S. it was me I'm the sorcerer)

Esteemed Justices Axford, Murphy, Tanner, and the (baby-like or bodacious, however we’re feeling today) Bailiff Jakey, I present to you the case of the Flying Camel Clutch: I am a forever DM who finally got to play in a high-level one-shot DM’d by one of my players. I built my dream character: a Goliath Bard (College of Dance) luchador, built for wrestling with Athletics expertise, the Grappler feat, and a one-level Paladin dip for smites on my unarmed strikes. The DM had chatted about the build and was excited to see it in action. In the final fight, we fought an adult red dragon. I used my goliath ability to grow Large, jumped onto its back, and successfully grappled it in a camel clutch. On the dragon’s turn, after getting wailed on by the party, it simply flew straight up with me still on it. I argued that the grappled condition reduces speed to 0, so it shouldn’t be able to move at all. The DM ruled that since I wasn’t specifically restraining its wings, it could still fly. The dragon later broke free, stayed airborne for the rest of the fight, and my carefully built grappler never mattered again. My question to the court: was I robbed of a sick moment or did I fly too close to the sun?

To the Supreme officials of this fraudulent court and their wonderful, esteemed bailiff whom I proudly call by his name JAKE. I write to you about an incident that still crosses my mind years later. I DM for a party of 5, a kenku rogue, a wood elf druid, a tabax bard, a tiefling paladin and a firbolg ranger. As apart of their quest they were trying to aquire a mythical trident, one that needed to be acquired through trials. The villianous group are also searching for said trident. The group was avout to aquire it with one trial left and an unavoidable fight was coming with the evil druid who wanted to use the trident as a way to plague the sea with disease. The kenku rogue came up with a plan, he wanted to forge 4 identical tridents, just like the one they'd never seen. I said how and he replied that his character sheet said he had advantage on producing forgeries and duplicates of existing objects, I said that meant more like documents or small items as their expert mimics and it didn't mean he could forge actual weapons like a blacksmith, the entire table erupted, they said that it was bullshit and that it literally contained the word forge and so should be able to do it, I looked up the meaning of the word forgeries to which they replied keep your real world definitions to myself so I relented, I let him make 4 separate rolls for each trident but with bardic, help actions and his high bonus, he succeeded in each roll being over 20 so I let them have it. Ultimately it all worked out in their favor and tricks the druid eventually impaling him with 5 tridents but I still feel like I was wronged in the moment. Judges, do you agree with me? Am I interpreting forgeries correctly? These are legacy kenku rogue stays btw.

Greetings to the Honorable Justices of D&D Court, and a respectful wink to the beautiful baby bailiff Johnthony I played my first-ever D&D session after years of listening to podcasts like NADDPOD. I made a deliberately non-optimized Alchemist, told my DM ahead of time I’d need bottles, and put real effort into roleplay.(Approved backstory, Character traits, time) I had three problem spots in this session. Problem one: At the very first shop, I spent 15 minutes arguing with an old lady NPC over buying bottles. She didn’t have any bottles anyway, no one helped me, and when I used Presdigitation to conjure a silver goblet to barter, the shopkeeper instantly saw through it with no roll, leaving me empty-handed. Problem two: Combat was theater of the mind with no map, positioning only tracked “in the DM’s head.” When I finished off an enemy, I described a brutal sailor-style kill (eye-stabbing, spitting). My friends were upset — but no boundaries or tone expectations were ever discussed in terms of violence, just that it was a world with technology present. Problem three: At a stable, when asked what horse I wanted, I said “the sexiest one.” I rolled a nat 20 to seduce it, only to be told afterward it wasn’t funny. So, D&D Court: Was I out of line, or were expectations never set? Should the DM rely entirely on vibes and memory? Did I deserve the bottles? And is seducing a horse on a nat 20 fair game? This was my first and only D&D session. Court is now in session.

Dear Judges of the Highest Order and Jakalakading Dong, I present to you the case of Ekko v. Bridge. I was a fairly new player and DM to DnD and gained my interest and honestly my obsession with it after coming across this podcast. My first time playing was in a homebrew campaign with a couple of my friends from college, where I created a young hippie druid named Ekko. Our DM told us that this world was very magical and full of mysteries that he had spent over five years coming up with, so we should create characters with very detailed backstories. Each character also needed a secret quirk tied to something that happened in the world’s history. This was a lot to take on as a new player, so I reached out to my DM and explained that this felt pretty daunting. I asked if we could develop Ekko’s backstory together so I could understand how it’s done. We decided that Ekko was a cursed vessel of an ancient demon and that every time he died he was forced to reincarnate, lose all his memories, but look completely the same. I thought this was extremely cool and got really excited about figuring out his character. Then my DM suggested giving him a fatal flaw. We decided Ekko would have a split personality. One side was extremely chill and carried the innocence of a child, while the other was a ruthless, battle hungry maniac that would destroy anything that threatened him. I was still fairly new to DnD, so I asked a lot of questions and needed a lot of clarification so I could keep up with my more seasoned party. During one of our missions, the entire party got stuck at a cursed bridge, face to face with some kind of eldritch spirit of lost souls. None of us could figure out how to get across, so much so that we spent three full sessions roleplaying the best way to do it. Whenever we asked the DM for hints, he would just tell us that we had to figure it out ourselves. I should also mention that our DM had a big tendency to speak in very convoluted and academic language both in and out of game, and we often had to ask him to dumb it down for us. On the fourth session, I finally asked if he could just clearly lay out our options because we were all obviously lost on how to proceed. He told us our options were to cross the bridge and see what happens or turn around and fail the mission. We decided to cross. As we were going over the bridge, I rolled a high Perception check to see if I noticed anything else and spotted what he described as a cool gold coin. When I grabbed the coin, the spirit immediately attacked the party, which sent Ekko into battle mode. I rolled high on initiative, attacked first, crit, and dealt a decent amount of damage. Right after my turn, the spirit threw Ekko into a wall and instantly killed him. The rest of the party ran away and left my body behind. After that, they started talking IRL about how stupid my choice was and how my character deserved that outcome. My DM agreed with them. At first, I was not really upset because I knew Ekko would reincarnate and thought it would be a cool story moment. But after about 20 minutes of in game and IRL berating, it started to hit hard. The icing on the cake was my DM saying that dumb actions have dumb consequences and that it was the dumbest choice he had ever seen someone make in DnD. This kicked off an argument between me, my DM, and the party wizard. The wizard said that everyone else in the party understood what was going on the whole time and that it was probably better if I made a new character because clearly I put no thought into Ekko. I decided to leave the session, go home, and take a chill pill. After that, I chose to leave the campaign because I felt more like a hindrance than an additive to the group. Later on, I got texts from the party cleric, who is also the DM’s partner. They told me they agreed with my actions and felt like the DM did this on purpose because he thought I was slowing the rest of the party down by asking so many questions. They also told me that the DM and the wizard had been talking for weeks about how annoyed they were that I took so much time to understand puzzles and that I constantly got into fights with monsters instead of thinking of other ways around them. So judges, I ask you. Am I crazy, or was Ekko doomed to fail from the start? P.S. We did end up working through our issues, and about a year later I played with this group again, but as the DM. That campaign lasted three years. I made the main villain an evil druid named Ekko, and in the final battle I threw my old DM’s character into a wall and had a nice laugh about it.

To the three illustrious geodes shimmering in quiet splendor, and you reading this, the dull piece of shale that I found under my porch. As a fun homebrew item, I let my party have a juicer "that can juice anything." At first, my intention was that the juicer would only work on things big enough to fit in it, but one player took the interpretation of anything to mean anything. I allowed it, it was funny and I figured it was harmless. I was wrong. Everything was fun and games for a while, juicing gold, weapons, the occasional goblin. That was until he met one of the gods of the campaign. He proceeds to produce the juicer, juice the god, drink the god, and become a god. At that point, I was fully willing to just let him ascend into the Pantheon and roll a new character, but he decided he wanted to role-play out what would happen next. He goes on a spree, drinking each god and gaining their power before eventually becoming the one remaining god above all. Should I have stopped this? The other players were amused and the gods weren't particularly important to my setting. I'm glad it happened, but I also feel like kind of a pushover. In my defense it was really, really funny.

O grandest honor to the illustrious justices. And secretary Jake. I come not with a rules query but a social one. Back in my sophomore year of college me, my partner, and a group of a few friends were planning to start a dnd group together. My partner and I were the most experienced in a group with a few first timers. As a kind gesture we decided to buy a set of dice for the 2 new players. One of the new players lived about an hour away and the only person who regularly saw him was our dm who was kind of sort of seeing him. Since we were all so busy we never got the chance to give the new player his gift so I asked the dm to give it to him for us. Cut to 3 years later. The dm and the new player are now in a serious relationship, and are my 2 closest adult friends and along with my partner are the 3 PCs at a table that I dm. The dice that we bought for him are one of his only sets of dice, and whenever he refers to that set he calls it the set that his girlfriend got him with no mention of me or my partner and no correction from her. Am I wrong to be P.O.ed about this? And what do I do in this situation if anything. Thank you so much, hate the show

Dice Christ Confessional: Seeking Penance I wish the dear clergy a merry eve, for mine has been somber. I am a DM for 2 homebrew campaigns with my friends and a player in a Curse of Strahd campaign with my cousins. I have only recently begun my tenure as a player and I fear for my character’s life if my dice rolls continue in their current manner. As a DM, I frequently roll high, often rolling 2-3 crits a session—so much so that I will fudge my rolls to make them lower. Alas, Dice Christ has heeded the call for lower rolls in a different way than anticipated. In last night’s Curse of Strahd session, I rolled seven Nat 1s, 4 of which were in a row. It was so bad, my cousin said “Please roll that again because I feel really bad for you.” I have thoroughly learned my lesson on the fudging of rolls and getting what I asked for, so I am seeking for this curse to be lifted, which is why I humbly confess to thee. XOXO. Amen.

Honorable high justices of the Crit (and…Jonk? I think?) I bring to you the case of the reluctant shark barbarian I belong to a group of very good friends who have been trying to begin a regularly-meeting campaign for a while now, but we have run into a hiccup with one of our own. She decided when we started a pirate-centric campaign that she wanted to be half person half shark, but the top half is shark. None of us necessarily had a problem with this when we began, but it has become a problem. We’ve played one shots previously with this person, and had some issues with her being on her phone instead of playing, and just telling us her character “chilled in a booth at the tavern” while the rest of us were working to solve a mystery. When we brought this up, it exploded in our faces and she was VERY upset. This came to a head in our second pirate session, while the party was fighting a bunch of skeletons on a ghost ship. On her turn, our shark barbarian, facing off against a few of the skeletons (who by this point were quite low on hp) just went “nah, I’m good” and basically skipped her turn. We were all sort of flabbergasted, including our DM who did the equivalent of an “are you sure?” which this player just brushed off. In the next turn, one of our PCs was badly hurt by the skeleton that our barbarian should have taken care of. She didn’t seem to see the problem with this shirking of the literal point of playing D&D, let alone as a martial class. What do we do about this problem player? She’s one of our best friends, but it’s pretty clear to the rest of us that she doesn’t actually care to play collaboratively with the rest of us, but will get very upset if there’s any inkling of her being excluded. The rest of us are very enthusiastic about this campaign and invested in making a story, while our shark barbarian can’t be bothered to even take her turn. I throw our party upon the mercy of the Supreme Crit and await their verdict.

To the effervescent judges and intern bake, I present to you the case of the mistaken protagonist. I am running a homebrew campaign with a group of 5 of my friends plus me DM-ing, with a setting of high fantasy gangsters. If you've ever played the Like a Dragons games, I'm attempting something like that but in the magical world of 5e. This however is the first campaign for myself and most of the table and as a result I have been proactive in homebrewing things for my players. Its a mess but a great way to get my new players participating and contributing directly to the story. However this most recent arc had one of my players push back on this approach. He plays a teen street urchin who has a tragic past who joined the gang to protect the people he loves. This player we'll call "Vern" is one of the two veteran TTRPG players at the table. So I created an arc where Vern's character would have to take a set of sell sword exams that forced them to confront their rival/best friend at the end. All the while the rest of the gang were investigating the big bads in the background. During this time most sessions were half the exam and half combat encounters that involved the whole party, including Vern. The arc ended with the rival revealing their villainous nature and escaping to fight another time after a large group combat that ended the exams pre-maturely. The table seemed to enjoy the arc though Vern didn't enjoy the spotlight. While they appreciated the puzzles and mechanics I came up with for them, they felt as though the attention on their character wasn't earned. So I ask the court, was I wrong to put so much campaign attention on Vern? I really enjoy their character and want to see them involved with the whole table but I worry I have committed the sin of laying it on too thick. Warmest regards, Liam B

To the effervescent judges and bailiff Jorkle Horkle. I bring you the case of the re-used trope. A few years ago during my group’s first campaign, my players were hunting a T-rex deep in the jungle. Upon spotting what they thought was the creature in a clearing, they leapt out and stuck with a surprise round, burning a lot of their resources. At the top of round two, I narrated that a larger dinosaur (their true target) crashed out of the trees and ate the first dinosaur, triggering the real fight. The result was positive; my players thought it was a cool cinematic moment, and the fight was a bit more challenging after they used some resources on the wrong creature. Fast forward a few months, and I guess I forgot that I used that trope already, because I accidentally did it again. My players were hunting a Roc in its nest, and right after they attacked, I had a larger Roc swoop down eat it. This time, however, my players were not as impressed, and had a good laugh mixed with some eyerolls about how it keeps happening to their characters. Judges, I cannot stress enough how much my players won’t let me live this down. To this day, I can’t say something is “large” without being razzed. If I describe a “large tome on a pedestal”, my players will say, “and then a BIGGER tome appears and eats that one.” I know that a bait-and-switch like that isn’t fun more than once, but since it was an accident, I wonder – is re-using a trope like this enough reason to be taken to the razzberry patch even years later? I submit myself to the wisdom of the court.

To the esteemed Justices and Bailiff Jake (hi Jake), we have a case of player AI usage. In our long-term campaign we have a player who is seemingly only at the table because they have FOMO. They are actively on their phone most of the session and when their turn in combat comes around they need the entire layout of the battle (and most of their own character's abilities) explained to them. Every. Time. At a recent session this player seemed more engaged than usual. When their turn came around they immediately said they wanted to cast vicious mockery on their opponent and even asked if they could say how they mocked that opponent in character! But it became pretty clear pretty fast that their mockery was written by AI. It was a full paragraph long with that extremely recognizable AI cadence and word choice. The group pretty quickly turned the mockery on to them, saying it was lame and lazy to use AI to write your barbs. They took the group razzing in stride and said they wouldn't do it again, but since then they have gone back to not really engaging. Were we too harsh on their first attempt to roleplay in battle, or is using AI to roleplay your character unforgiveable?

hello 2 crew and other associates, here lies my case, if it may please the court! Have I ruined DnD by being too much of a “good” character? Some context, my character is a very basic cleric, who wants to heal his friends and started adventuring to make sure his brother would survive the adventure. I love this character, simple as he may be and it was always fun for me to focus on healing and boosting my party members rather than attacking. However, some encounters felt like they could be solved in ways other than combat and I wanted to try it out, suggesting it to the party every time I saw the opportunity, which got my character deemed as “the most annoying character to exist” by the DM. I laughed it off at the time, but have since tried to follow what the DM wants more specifically: one time, there was a little plant that kept following us and no one wanted to touch it, as it seemed obvious it would trigger something, but the plant KEPT following us no matter what, so, thinking the DM wanted us to initiate things, my character picked it up! Big mistake, I was called an idiot and laughed at. Justices… help?? Am I messing up constantly? I humbly await your judgement.

Dearest Honorable Crits, i present the case of personal hell. The party needed to steal a gem of planes-shifting from the villains. One player accidentally triggered one, and was warped to hell, where they began to rescue NPCs important to the party from personalized hells. The other PCs encountered a villain, who offered them a gem. Because one of the NPCs i mentioned was one of their husbands. The player was so intent on getting to that scene that she didn't ask any questions, and they were consequently trapped in their own personal hell and missed it entirely. As DM, did i utterly fail to reinforce this self-admitted villain may be lying, in seperating the party at all, or does the fault lay in another aspect?

The case of “LASERS “ (Dr. Evil voice) Honorable crit masters of the high council and the guy who is on this podcast but isn’t granted the rank of justice. I present to you a potential wrongful razzing or a rightful one. Years back I made a homebrew sci fi campaign that ran off Star Wars 5e rules. It was homebrew to allow for all kinds of sci fi inspiration not set in Star Wars. Regardless during the grand finally the party was infiltrating a massive battle starship. On board the party had to fight and sneak their way to the BBEG. One encounter was a laser grid obstacle course to get through to unlock a door. My then girlfriend (now wife) decided to use the force camouflage ability to go invisible and run through. She said “how laser sensors work is you break the light beam and it goes off if I’m invisible nothing breaks the beam.” I said okay you can try that and then had a small riot on my hands where she rallied half the players to demand I tell them if I would rule this possible because if not she won’t try it. I normally say you have to try it to find out but to keep the peace said no it’s a sci fi world where cloaking devices are common and that’s not how these lasers work because it be pretty useless if most crews had someone who could easily get through no roll needed. Then more arguing with some players defending my right to decide. I ultimately caved and said sure it won’t sound an alarm then rolled 3d8 damage as it’s like being shot with laser rifles. They won and it ended with a great sci fi battle. However, she was very mad at this and still brings it up that I was beaten and should have just let her do it without arguing or giving damage.

To the supreme high court justices, and the Baja bailiff, I come to you with the case of psyops trained gnome. I joined a friend of a friend's campaign that was being run by a couple (One was the story DM, one the combat DM) who also hosted the sessions in person at their apartment. The campaign had been going on for a while now, but I jumped in Media res. We had just arrived via boat to a frigid port town that had a magistrate government that was cracking down and trying to root out a cult of a dragon. We do some asking around talking to NPCs and they are all pretty unhelpful and don't want to tell us anything. We decided to go to the tavern to group up and meet the people in a relaxed setting. While there we met a gnome who was the Dock manager and she was happy to tell us about the situation in town. While talking with her she hesitated and made some allusions to things not being what they seem. Suspicious of this, our party's Druid (having just leveled up and taken the Telepathic feat) cast Detect Thoughts. When asked what she was thinking about? They said she was thinking about frogs. Frogs? Yes frogs. The DM out of character then says that if she is involved in anything clandestine she may be trained to resist mind reading. The druid was pretty new to DnD, but I asked if those are her surface thoughts what about the deeper probe with the saving throw. She rolls. Fails the saving throw. She was still thinking about frogs. So I ask you oh judges. Was it fair or just for this Gnome (who was part of a secret society that was misbranded as a cult by the government) to be able to resist the spell? I lay these frogs at your feet and hope that justice hops in the right direction. P.S. There was later a random exotic animal shop that was fully contained in an anti magic field to make sure that we didn't do any shenanigans. Also the campaign fell apart shortly after from general lack of direction and enthusiasm (the DM would say I don't feel like roleplaying this is roughly what the NPC says)

To the righteous justices, Axford, Tanner, and Murphy and also to you baliff Jake, I come to you already guilty. No judgement needed. I am the guilty party, deserving the highest degree of punishment. My crime: wanting to dm and never being able to follow through. I have everything: a fantastic group eager to play, DnD books aplenty, a clear social calendar but with all campaigns I start, they all seem to fizz out. And the problem is me! I have tried homebrew campaigns, prewritten campaigns (shout-out to Ghosts of Saltmarsh), and though I have luck with one shots, they always seem to balloon out to larger campaigns that I never finish. I feel like I'm always letting my group down. I humbly accept, nay, demand any punishment you have for me, thank you and Dice Christ be with you.

Greetings almighty judges and mediocre at best baliff! I bring you the case of the railroaded cannibal. In an online game that went a while but I eventually left due to the toxic political opinions of the GM, I played an ex-crusader who had been cursed by an enemy wizard after I captured a city. I established he had ptsd and had bad experiences during the war, but left it vague. A few months in the Gm said we would do a one on one flashback session. I played my time during the war. I assumed it would lead to me being cursed after a victory against the enemy. I was correct - but the GM narrated that the curse made me into a mindless cannibal, and described me eating innocent people including children. At the time I was surprised. I thought my guy was morally gray, and had done bad things in the war. But I certainly did not think, nor was I playing him as, a cannibal. I tried to take it in stride, but now I am a year after leaving the campaign, I can see it as completely batshit insane. Who would do that sort of thing? Mostly, I just want you to sentence the GM for narrating me eating children in a flashback. Especially given his objectionable real life beliefs.

Greetings to the honourable judges and the tolerable bailiff. I bring you the case of the gloating player. I play a ranger in a witchlight campaign and one of the other players warlock had died so they were introducing their new wizard. They were from some investigative agency searching for a different member of the party. This was a little suspicious but we let them join the party anyway. Cut to many sessions later, the wizard kidnaps my ranger by teleporting us away. Apparently, they were actually tracking my ranger down because of his gambling debts. In the moment this was an awesome surprise. But when the session ended, the wizard player kept gloating about how we didn’t see it coming, asking why we even let them join the party with no reason to trust them. Even saying that in the past they have taken advantage of the fact that people will always trust a PC. Judges, we let them join because this is dnd and we’re all here to have fun. The alternative is we tell the wizard to get lost and the player doesn’t get to play the game. Should we have let the suspicious wizard join the party or should we have told them to fuck off?

To the esteemed justices Axford, Murphy, and Tanner and the venerable/repugnant bailiff Jonk (however we feel this go-round). I present the case of "I was just tryna be a PC for once " I am the forever DM and happily so so, for the most part. However it was my bday (Murph I swear it's pertinent to the story) and I asked my friend (F1) (normally a PC) if he'd DM a one shot so I could sit on the other side of the screen for a session. All was going well in our all-out combat against the forces of hell when disaster struck. My other friend (F2), who was playing as well, got hit with an necrotic cloud and did nothing in that moment. Then about 1 minute into me figuring out what my Orc Bard (Shrapn'nell Roan) was gonna do, F2 pipes in with "can I use absorb elements" F1 says he would've had to do that before my turn started as it's a reaction. I mentioned it also doesn't do necrotic bc it's elements. At this point F2 threw an epic tantrum screaming about how he never gets to do anything cool and we just shut him down so fast. He storms off to his room and slams the door (we're house Mates fyi) We go around the rest of that round of combat and I decide to go coax the mf'er out. We did enjoy the rest of the session, but justices was this insane and what would you have done with a player being so wrong but so convinced they're right...or aitah I await your righteous judgement and may Dice Christ have mercy on my soul

Forgive me, oh hierarchy of cultists for I may have sinned. I present the case of the TP-KO. I was running a table with 5 level 3 PCs and they were fighting a Giant Ape. The Giant Ape was strong, but I’ve seen these guys take down far worse before, and he was really really hurt. However, rather than attacking this injured Apex Primate, they panicked and just stayed healing each other. Dabbing each other for 8 HP is fine, but when the Giant Ape is multi attacking for 25 HP per hit, they quickly all went down. Miraculously, 4 PCs managed to pass their death saves and the fifth was close behind, but then what? I was sweating, I’ve had to deal with a TPK before, but they all passed and were just knocked out. Do I… just narrate that night falls, & the Giant Ape leaves? That feels cheap, but what happened next feels cheaper to me. I was making a final death save for Custer, an NPC that they insisted I bring along, as well as they insisted he get death saves. He had two success already and he rolled a 19… sensing opportunity, I whooped and thought “close enough for me!” And declared that Custer had rolled a Nat 20, giving him 1 HP. Custer then ran and healed the cleric who got everyone else up… but the party beat feet out of there, ditching Custer who the final PC saw go down. Worse, Custer was the son of the captain of the ship, whom they had sworn they would protect. It was a challenging ride back to port, but I beseech Dice Christ, was I too far in the wrong? Should I have gone for the honest but boring TPKO, or was 19 close enough to give me an out? Did Custer pay the price for my sins, or did I just find a new BBEG? I await your conclave decision.

To the bailiff in the stinky diapy that’s not distended enough to be holding a solid stool and the well-mannered future heads of state eating mushed peas and pumpkin without spilling a drop: Over two sessions in the first three days of the new year I concluded a campaign that had been going for the best part of three years. The first campaign I ever ran, as well. The monster I used had two forms. The second was accessed via a rift into an extraplanar nonspace, the Amalgamation’s home. This second form had a bunch of new damage resistances in addition to the first Lair Action my players had faced. Our wizard had used lighting damage to great effect with the first form, but that was the (only) new damage immunity in the second form. When the party went into the rift, the first spell my wizard used was lightning bolt. I made a show of asking about the damage total and type and then not writing anything down or looking away from the wizard. He proceeded to only cast lighting spells for two more full rounds of combat. At that point some of the other players had given friendly nudges about damage types, and one (on the wizards third turn) finally said “I think it’s immune to lightning damage”. He looked at me, I confirmed, and he went red in the face before excusing himself to use the bathroom. It was very quiet in the moment but he later said he “had to take a while to compose himself”. Long story short we ended up getting into a heated but very very brief argument with the wizard accusing me of deliberately concealing this new information and deliberately making him look stupid, and me maintaining that he asked no in-game questions, didn’t follow up on skill checks and also ignored me in real life. Luckily the other players (who all have a bit more experience than the wizard) helped explain that this isn’t a gotcha and it’s just part of the game. In no way was I trying to punk him, but our wizard was still heated at me personally. We finished the sessions amicably and he had a wonderful story beat via back to back nat 20s later on, permanently turning the party’s bug mascot Brad into an Ancient Solar Dragon. But he still seemed / seems upset about this. Justices, did I do anything wrong? I feel like I did all I could (without blatantly spoon feeding the information) to get him to roll checks or ask questions. He did neither, and at this point everyone in the group has been playing for years, so what else was I to do? Its 2026, the year is still a baby wearing a now slightly ratty silken sash, and I am an ancient 28. Yet the venerable justices are also in diapies, so I trust your judgment and accept any sentence.

Dice Christ Confession (a Strahd x Kate Beckinsale confession). I fear I fell to the siren song of a cheap trick and beg the court’s forgiveness: My first time DMing was a Strahd campaign on Zoom in 2020. I felt very self-conscious about creating NPCs that my players felt invested in, so as I was introducing an important homebrewed NPC (a Druid named Adele) I casually mentioned she looked exactly like Kate Beckinsale from Underworld. My players’ eyes snapped up and they started clamoring to help her and her family. This cheap trick worked, and my players couldn’t wait to engage with Adele whenever they could. I did build out Adele as a character more and she became a key part of subsequent campaigns we played with those characters, but I feel guilty at my initial paper-thin characterization and the shallow engagement opportunity. I beg Dice Christ’s forgiveness and commit to more meaningful depth of character going forward.

Dearest delectable Judges and stinky winky pumpkin eating bailiff Jakey, I bow down before thee with an explosive case! I am fairly new to D&D and decided take a stab at DMing so I ran a 5e homebrew campaign with five of my friends. Over the course of several sessions, one of the players, a Warlock Dragonborn, began butting heads with the party by looting everything in arms reach and would even try stealing from the players during key plot points in the story. The players, not fond of the Warlock’s antics, became on edge around him, especially after he sold their ship for 35 gold. Eventually, the party found themselves in a schizophrenic old man’s cabin in the woods who was tied to another player’s backstory. This old man was quite the tinkerer and had vast amounts of explosives and blackpowder barrels scattered around his property. The Warlock, starstruck by the destructive potential in front of him, decided to use his Unseen Servant to steal a landmine from the back room. I warned the Warlock that a Sleight of Hand check would need to be rolled with disadvantage since the landmine was fairly large. The Warlock proceeded to cast his servant and entered the back room. At this point, I warned him once more that this check would need to be done with disadvantage but that didn’t stop him despite everyone also being in the cabin. Judges, you may be able to guess what happened next. The Unseen Servant rolled a 9 and set off a chain reaction in the cabin, promptly eviscerating it and everything inside. Luckily, majority of the party was able to escape except for the Warlock and the Bard. The Warlock was surprised to hear that his level 4 character immediately died after taking 136 force damage. The party was in awe at what just happened. He then went quiet until I eventually asked if everyone would be able to make it to the next session to where he said he wouldn’t be playing in this campaign anymore. Judges, was I wrong for giving this Warlock disadvantage on this check or was it justified given the situation? I await your verdict…

To the petit justices and giant Jake (no wait I screwed it up damn damn damn). I present to you the case of the PC businessmen. I'm running a Shadowdark campaign for an in-person group. Because Shadowdark is a fairly lethal system oriented towards dungeon-crawling, I figured I'd go for an episodic format. After session 0, one of the PCs (selected at random) inherited a tavern with a jobs board to serve as the framing device; jobs appear on the board, players pick one, and that's the next session. However, I always also tell the players that if something else has come up that they're interested in, they can pursue that instead. Unfortunately, the PCs have become much more attached to being small business owners than I thought they would. After one dungeon they started asking about renovations. Could they upgrade the menu with enough gold? That troll they found in a dungeon that they could talk to, could they hire him? How is high-quality mead produced in this setting, and how could they establish a supply line for mead to increase revenues? I picked this system because it skips the fluff of something like 5e or PF2e and just gets straight to dungeon crawling. Should my PCs have taken the hint (and also, you know, read the campaign description), or should I have known that TTRPGers would grow attached to a shop? If you must punish me, please make it croissant themed.

Honored Crit Justices & Crit Justice Adjacents, today I come with a case of Mis-Manage-ment When I started playing at my table about a year and a half ago, we were all current and former coworkers. A while back, our DM added a current member of management at our job to our party, and since then I've changed departments and my DM is now my direct supervisor and the manager is over the department we're both in. I love playing with my table, but things have definitely been more tense at work as of late, and I'm afraid that some of that will bleed into our game. As a person, I like the manager. He's a lot of fun to play with. But, as a manager, he's been *a lot* recently. Do you all in your infinite wisdom think it'll all work out, or do we need to reconsider some aspects of our table? Ps: after the 1st session with the manager, the DM put a "no work talk" rule to kinda keep tensions down after former employees at the table we're venting about their time with our company

To the court, and the bailiff of questionable nature: I present the case of the train conductor dungeon master. For context, I've been playing with this group for years. I was eager to play after starting to listen to NADDPOD during the early days of the pandemic. The dungeon master is one of my best friend's dad. He is a great guy and fun to be around. The problem lies in the fact that I wrote a three page backstory. I was proud of it, and submitted it to DM. He also liked it, but then immediately changed major details, as far to saying that my character spoke with an accent. On top of this, he consistently denies actions that he would deem contrary to his version of the story- such as not allowing abilities from the PHB, and often interrupting (loudly) as we dictated our actions, not allowing us to finish, or explain the mechanical details of how we would pull stuff off. I love the man to death but I pose the question- who is the asshole here?

To the honorable Justices Axford and Tanner, the beautiful sexy hunky man of men Jake, oh and Durf I bring you the case of "it's what my character would do." It was my first time playing D&D with a group of college friends in a Pegan inspired campaign, session one we set out on a ship to an island to investigate and incident involving some sirens. We arrived at an island and my character decided to stay on the ship, side note that will be important later, my character's and daughter were murdered by sirens. The other two PCs went to find the siren in the Salt water lake in the center of the island. Long story short they get to her and she is trapped and offered to exchange information if we put her back in the sea. The PCs obliged and we're bringing her back when the DM turns to me and says to roll a charisma saving throw and a perception check. I roll a natural 1 (+3) on Char and a 18 (+1) on my perception. The DM then says "you see a sirens you don't know if its the one that killed your family but it might be" I said id like to talk to it, he said "no you rolled a nat 1 you loose your cool and have to attack." so after mild railroad allegations I just roll. Nat fucking 20, I roll for damage and kill the siren. My party was furious (even at the table outside of game) one of them saying they need a break because I ruined their plan for the session. Justices Axford, Tanner and man of men Jake was i in the wrong here, should I have just rolled damage by chucking a dice at my DM, I await your verdict. Murph you can sit with the adults again if you behave.

To the esteemed skips and the lowly front-end (this is a curling joke), I present the case of D&D on ice! I recently participated in a Dungeons and Dragons themed curling tournament (curling like the sport with the stones and brooms). In this version of curling, each team member selected a class that gave them "spells" they could use during the game. For example, the Bard had Polymorph, where they could turn one stone into a rubber duck, the Rogue had Set Trap that let them put a cone on the ice that you weren't allowed to hit with a stone, and the Cleric had Kati's Adorable Sweater, which put a crocheted sweater on a stone that dampens your ability to hit it. The conflict I bring is this: in the rules, there was specifically no Counterspell (previous iterations of this tournament had that as a spell, but it was removed this year), or using your spell to stop another players spell. In one end (round), the other team played a spell called Bait and Switch (Fighter), which allows you to swap two in-play stones. We were about to win 3 points, and by doing this they got 2 instead (For the sake of keeping this concise I won't fully explain the scoring system of curling, just trust me!). We then played our own Bait and Switch spell, and switched the stone they had just put on the button (scoring stone) with a DIFFERENT stone than they had moved. So, they put stone 1 in the place of stone 2, and then we put stone 1 in the place of stone 3. The other team objected, saying that this was a form of Counterspell. I ask the experts, since we did not move the exact same stones to reset the ice to where it was originally, does this count as a counterspell? I eagerly await your judgement! Sincerely, On Thin Ice in Alabama P.S. Some extra context: The Game Master ultimately decided in our favor, though we later heard that the tournament leader wouldn't have allowed it if she had been on the ice. We still lost by like 7 points despite this, so no one was truly hurt.

Hey y'all and Cake I think A friend of mine was DMing and I just can't get out of my mind his Ruling about needing to stock a Spell at a higher level to cast at said higher level. Ive never seen a rule in any book regarding stocking at a different levels. I feel like the rules I read were pretty clear and he was inventing stuff in that moment and not calling it a house rule. It make sense to me you stock your spell list and if you have the spell slot and the spell on the list you can cast it. He was a stickler for things like if I said I wanted to cast hexblade's curse on a opponent after I attacked him we wouldn't let the bonus damage count until the next turn. I had to make sure I used my bonus action first it wasn't even I said ny turn was over and the next player had started their turn and I wanted to back track.

What up dorks, it's ya boi. The one and only, durdunkin. I am writing you today about a friend of mine. We have all been a group playing dnd for around 15 years. One of my friends doesn't seem to think much about others when it comes to loot. He likes to be the one to immediately look for loot after a battle (OR DURING). This typically doesn't cause any problems because he will share. The past 2 sessions he has done this, and kept items to himself that doesn't even make sense to his class. I made a custom Sickle for a Druid of the group. Why is a fighter claiming the item when he literally can not use any of its mechanics? Or a frog cloak I made for the wizard to add "soak" to her cantrips which intensify her ele spells damage on the soaked target. I'm lost, I've brought it up and his response was "it's for my next character". What the fuck does that even mean? Your next character is going to be a wizard druid that somehow keeps your current items? He's an avoidant and non confrontational. It's like pulling teeth to get him to communicate anything. I don't want to kick him out because his girlfriend just started and she's doing well and enjoying herself. She was also supposed to be the owner of the frog cloak. Justices of the crick and the forlorn bailiff of the mountain. What do I even do about this? I'm truly at a loss. Ps. This is scratching the surface of items and things he's done this too now.

To the Holy Saints of Dice Christ, I kneel before the alter to confess my lack of reading comprehension skills. At the start of my current long running campaign, I decided to play a kensei monk (shoutout to Jabari). I usually play casters, so I was excited to try a purely martial class. Note that between my previous campaign and the current one, the new 2024 rules had just released and D&D Beyond had updated character creation accordingly, unbeknownst to myself. My DM specifically stated he would like our group to stick to the 2014 rules. No problem. However, it was not until the spring of 2025 that I realized my sin. I did not scroll far enough to see the clear distinction between the new class options and the “legacy” class options. Many of the monk features I had come to love and appreciate were used in clear violation of the agreed campaign terms. I have compared the differences and now play my monk as I should. I pray for the forgiveness of the church and hope none of my other PCs hear this.

I wish to make a confession to the disciples of Dice Christ. I am pretty poor at planning encounters of the appropriate challenge rating, so I will sometimes fudge things to keep the battle interesting while trying to be fair to my players. Several years ago I was running a Thanksgiving themed one-shot, and because I wasn’t used to these characters my final encounter was too easy. The players had hunted down the dreaded Goliath Turkey (with T-Rex stats) and successfully ambushed it. At the end of round 2 the Turkey had missed all its attacks with a few Nat 1s, and a player had technically killed it which didn’t feel very satisfying. I decided to keep it alive long enough to get one more turn, but of course it rolls a nat 20 on someone and outright killed them. I let the player decide how he died and he chose to be bitten in half vertically. The players rallied and finished off the turkey and a feast was thrown in their honor. Given that it was a one shot we were all pretty happy with what happened but I still feel guilty about it. RIP Marty “Bolts” Beardsley.

To the honorable justices and the Bailiff who is, frankly, fine, I submit a case that’s left me feeling a bit adrift. I’ve been DMing a monthly campaign for about a year with some friends. They’re new players, and we’ve been having a great time - or so I thought. Recently, one of them couldn’t make it - he’d accidentally double booked himself with a birthday party for an acquaintance’s three year old. We all razzed him mildly but appropriately, given that he was leaving the game right before a boss fight to party with a baby. He came to the first hour or so of the game that day. When he left, we exchanged hugs and high fives, and I thought all was well. The next day, though, he texted asking if he could come meet me for lunch near my office. This felt a bit weird - it was a workday and pretty short notice - but I agreed. Justices, as soon as I arrived, it became clear that he had asked me out to break up with me - more specifically, with our D&D game. Over the course of an hour, he told me he “just couldn’t give me what I need” and that he “didn’t have the stamina for this kind of thing” - everything short of “it’s not you, it’s me.” I offered alternatives like changing to a simpler class if he was struggling with rules (he had been playing a sorcerer) or just leaving early if he got tired during sessions, but he was having none of it. “I just want a clean break,” he told me. He also didn’t want to tell the group himself, but he did leave an in-character breakup note outside of my apartment - without stopping in to say hello - the day before our next game. Needless to say, the rest of group was extremely bummed and just as confused as I was. I love the guy, our friendship remains intact, and the game has continued without him, but this was *weird* and I can’t shake the feeling I did something wrong. Could I have done something differently to accommodate a newer player? Why the dramatics and public break-up instead of a quick post-game chat? Were there signs I missed before this blissful union turned sour? I submit myself and my table to the mercy of the Divorce Court. Thank you for your consideration. Sincerely, Broken Up With in the Midwest

Honorable Justices Murph, Emily, Caldwell, and the incredulous, aweinspiring bailiff Jim Hersheys, I present to you the case of Hue Man Mchewmin, a dragonborn monk responsible for being the catalyst to retconning a whole session. This happened a decade ago, I still think about it and laugh but wonder if I was wronged in this situation. This was our first campaign (both DM and players) and in a previous session, our Barbarian, Arnbjorn had gone pvp against the party unprompted so the party left him tied up in a cave. We decided that I was going to take his axe as payment for the grief he had caused the group. Fast forward to this session, we're in town and Hue Man decides he wants to go to the market early in the morning and sell the are, fully cartwheeling away. (Above the table, the DM had allowed the barbarian back in after setting some ground rules) Meanwhile Arnbjorn busts into the tavern yelling "WHERES MY AXE???" The party points towards the market, he gives chase and the party follows. Cut to me selling his Axe for like pennies to this little imp and then going to frolick away. Arnbjorn sees the imp and decides to take a swing and the DM gives the first wink wink "youre in a bustling market, are you sure?" Arnbjorn swings, misses, and kills 2 civilians passing by. The guards are summoned and a fight ensues as the party is catching up. Our wizard sees him in trouble and decides to cast thunderwave. The DM is seething through his teeth "you. Are. In. A bustling... market.. are you absolutely sure about that?" They did not process the DM wink wink nudge nudge... "You kill 20 civilians and the party ends up on a country wide wanted list, effectively destroying all of the plans I had set out for this campaign" (again first time DM, pivoting like that is not going to be his strong suit) We decided to retcon the session as a group but the DM decided at the beginning of the next session that I had simply given the axe back to the barbarian already and that we'd continue from there. Justices was I wronged in the DM deciding that my character gives back the axe retroactively in order to keep the peace in the party? I humbly await your judgement

To the honorable justices Axford the Altruistic, Murphy the Meticulous, and Tanner the Trustworthy, and, I think Ajax, the janitor? I bring the case of the Ex-Wife's New Boyfriend. My nine year old son wants to try D&D, so of course I agreed to run a game for him and his friends. He excitedly announced this fact during drop off at his mother's house, as we share custody 50/50. To my surprise, he invited her *and her new boyfriend* to join the game, which the boyfriend excitedly agreed to. No problem, I've DMed for decades and I'm on good terms with my ex-wife, so even though I didn't know the boyfriend much yet, I happily agreed... I've prepared the session, a simple dungeon crawl, some rooms with mooks and one with a mini boss, a trap or two, and then the big baddie at the end, just to let them learn the basics of the system. Everyone gets a level 3 character so they don't have too many options... But now I have received their sheets, and I'm panicking - all the kids want to play either full casters or a ranged rogue... And the boyfriend wants to play a barbarian. If I have the enemies mostly target the barbarian as I normally would, because he's the only meat shield and the only one that's not hidden or hanging back, people are going to think I'm "that guy", trying to kill the new boyfriend's character. If I have the enemies target the kid's characters their first experience with d&d will be mostly rolling death saves and they won't want to play again. I need the help of the supreme crit, I just want the kids to have fun, and keep all the adults feeling welcome. (Don't read this until after they give their answers) P.S. Any advice on how to kill a barbarian, without it looking like you're actively targeting them? Asking for a friend.

Hello to the honorable judges and I guess hi to Joel if he's there. I bring you the "Case of the OC Art" I joined a Friend's discord server so we could be on voice chat while we play games. I saw that they wanted to start a D&D campaign so I asked to join but I got wait listed. Fast forward a year and half and my friend dm's me that a spot opened up and I jumped at the chance to play. We played weekly for almost 2 years! I had created a Harengon College of swords bard named Hopscotch. He was on a mission to find his owner that never returned. The twist was that his owner was a Drag Queen named Kesha MiOutside, but he never saw him in Drag and he called him Dad so he never knew his Drag name. He didn't know he was traveling with his Dad's former Party. I love playing as Hopscotch so much that I braved the Twitter and posted that I was looking for an Artist to draw my OC. 2 months and 1 commission fee later, I had brought Hopscotch to life! I was so excited to debut his art to the group but when I did my big reveal no one said anything. I was bummed but we continued with the session as normal. Finally at the end of the session the DM tells me that the group wanted to say something about my Character Art. I eagerly awaited for their opinions. My friend and owner of the discord chimed in first and said "Hopscotch is Ugly" and the rest of the group agreed. I said "oh, okay and left the discord call". I told my other friends and my partner what happened and they told me to leave the group. I listened to their opinions and agreed to leave the group the next day. Fast forward a year later and I am now questioning if I overreacted and if I should have tossed it up to some friendly Razzing. Do y'all think I did the right thing or have I over analyze the situation? I humbly await for your input.

To the beloved and benevolent justices Murphy, Axford, and Tanner and that guy that reads the cases out: I present to you the Polymorphed Lava Drop. On New Years Day, I ran a level 20-one shot with my players. Their foe: an ancient red dragon (2014 Monster Manual stat block). While the session was an overall fun experience and everyone seemed to enjoy themselves, I fear I may have made a ruling as a DM that could earn me a rightful punishment. Several rounds into combat, the warlock in the party used their only level 9 spell (psychic scream) to stun my dragon. They were successful and I was out of legendary resistances so had no other choice but to allow the party to wham the dragon and get the monstrous HP down. Unlike other spells that invoke the stun condition, the only way to break it is to succeed on an intelligence save at the end of your turn. However, the warlocks DC was so high that in order to do so I HAD to roll a nat 20. The dragon remained stunned for several more rounds (as I did not want to upset Dice Christ) when the sorcerer used polymorph to turn him into a mouse. The party proceeded to drop the mouse into a lava pit and deal an exorbitant amount of damage. Where I fear I went wrong is that I ruled the damage would count despite my dragon being immune to fire damage because he took it in mouse form, HOWEVER this would knock him out of the stunned condition since he would return to his natural form in his element. While my players agreed and went along with their plan anyway, I worry that I may have wasted the 9th level spell the warlock had cast. So I ask you, justices, do you feel I made the right move bringing the dragons actions back into the fray? Or do I deserve a punishment equivalent to being turned into a mouse and dropped into a vat of lava? My fate remains in your hands. (Epilogue: the dragons HP was knocked down significantly in this instance and it only took my players 2-3 more rounds to finish him - with the warlock in question dealing the final blow.)

Dearest justices, Axford, Tanner, and Murphy. Googoo gaga to the Baby Balif. Years ago I was playing my first ever session of 5e dnd with a party of 9 people, too many. Our DM kept everyone in line by firing a nerf gun at anyone disrupting the flow too much. This was agreed upon and not the issue I bring today. My one friend, Jake, was making a character at the table because he joined last minute, decided to play a cleric that was effectively just a suit of armor and only had eyes exposed. No race was decided. Immediately, another player, Carl, starting hounding him about what he was hiding, rolling several investigation checks to determine what race Jake was playing and generally confrontational. Everything came to a head later when my gnome was making some tinker toy robots and I had a good roleplay with our warforge, Dave, who greatly disliked them as they were offensive. Then out of character, Carl said it was just like wearing black face and my gnome was being racist for making toys. There were several other small annoyances during the session. We never had another session and I literally never saw Carl again lol. Judges, is making robot toys as a gnome racist against warforge? P.S. I have since gotten better friends thanks to the advice of Justice Murphy

To the absolute power throuple of the court and the harlet attempting to tear them apart. I come with a query: Is it okay to skip out on an arc? Don’t get it twisted, my DM is incredible! So far in our campaign, we’ve had a ghost pirate ship battle, a conspiracy at the World’s Fair, and a murder mystery at fantasy Wrestle Mania. However, the past few months and dozen sessions have been dominated by a political intrigue plot, and personally, I’ve never really clicked with political intrigue. My tiefling storm sorcerer has no real connection to the ongoing election since he’s originally from a distant kingdom and thus can’t vote or has any real attachment to any candidate. Currently, I feel like I can only be an ancillary character in the other PC’s plotlines as I make preparations for an endgame heist of my soul coin being kept by the devil that made a deal with one of my ancestors. I have spoken with my DM about not being into political intrigue and she has given me a subplot of playing double agent and thwarting a hostile takeover of a casino the devil has his eye on. However, this derailment of the takeover has been slow, with no obvious signs of progression for several sessions. While being met with the rogue vocalizing I’m making bad decisions, despite nearly all of my social encounters going my way. Justices, is it okay to break a personal unspoken rule of asking how long this arc might be and potentially bow out, as the in-game election is months away and we haven’t had a time skip of that magnitude before, or should I attempt to stick it out and find a new angle to view this arc? I humbly ask for your guidance and accept any punishment you bestow upon me.

To the Rachel-like Justices and the frankly Marco-adjacent Bailff, I bring to you a case of Denied Detection. We were playing a gang of fantasy criminals, doing dirty work for coin the the shadows of a major city (think Thief: The Dark Project). After a few heists, a rival gang invited us to discuss a mutually beneficial sore. I was suspicious! When we entered the agreed meeting place - a Tavern - my sorcerer used Subtle Spell to cast Detect Thoughts, bouncing from patron to patron and only scanning surface thoughts. I didn’t pick up anyone thinking about us, feeling nervous, hostile, etc, so I relaxed - confident it wasn’t a trap. It was a trap. EVERY NPC in the bar pulled weapons on us. My sorcerer was killed in the first round. The others survived the ambush, I made a new character, and we played a few more sessions before the campaign fizzled out. Later the GM told me that our PCs and the tavern-wide ambush just wasn’t the first thing on anyone’s minds. Justices, is it crazy to think that the “surface thoughts” of a dozen or so criminals planning an ambush wouldn’t include the impending ambush? Or am I due reparations for a slain sorcerer? -Ben

To the high Pope Axford and her Richelieu-esk Cardinals, I come before their holinesses with an ardent supplication for mercy and absolution. I fear I have sinned grievously against Dice Christ. My sin occurred recently while I was DMing a one shot for my group during a hiatus. My wife, our usual DM could not make the session due to work, but like a temptress on my shoulder, or a court eunic she offered me counsel. She whispered in my ear the sweet promises of power over players and total dominion of the battle field, and "It's just a one shot, what's the harm? Put the fear of God in them and run an adult dragon, it's not that high of a CR." And in my weakness and ignorance I fell to her womanly wiles and ran an adult red dragon against my players. Your holinesses, this was a cooking competition one-shot, and I failed to tell them to expect combat. None of them were prepared for the carnage that followed. I shall not soil these hallowed halls by retelling such a vile tale,but in this great sin of an unattended TPK, I committed an even greater sin: I lied about a natural 20. One of the players was attempting to cast a non-combat spells in a very creative way and I just wanted somebody at the table to have some sort of win that day, so I committed a false hood in the name of Dice Christ and said they target failed their save. Perhaps the worst part is that the tool with which I have sinned, a set of beautiful sparkly pink dice, have not rolled above a 10 since. I fear that the lord of luck has seen fit to show me only the aspect of a vengeful but just god, hiding from me all sides of the die that are good and gentle. How am I to atone for this misdeed? Must I offer up my precious dice as a burnt offering to our Dice God? Your holinesses, please offer this poor soul a form of penance so that I may roll my pretty dice and have an honest crit. P.S. my wife has never done anything wrong, she is the light of my life and the best, most benevolent DM to our group. She needs no forgiveness for she has never once sinned in the name of dice christ unlike her foul wife.

i humbly approach the clergy with a horrible admission for which i am seeking absolution with humble prostration. when i started playing D&D i was taught 3.5 and we played it mostly as a dice/combat game. several years passed before i played again, this time as a cocky teenager trying to impress her ~boys~. to me, D&D became less of a collaborative story and more of a way to power scale my way to rolling the best possible number. i eventually found a group to stick with and we played well together, with my characters usually being the comedic relief healer. because of this, i picked up a nasty habit of… lying about every out of combat roll i made. i just. picked what i thought would be the funniest or coolest option. this habit persisted for *years* and even traveled with me across systems to other games. i very rarely used any of the rolls i was actually given, and due to the online nature of our games, i was never investigated. the group has since disbanded and i have since learned to trust the dice, but the shame of my guilt still weighs on me to this day…

Dearest Supreme Crit Justices Murphy, Axford, and Tanner, as well as the loveable yet incredibly razzable bailiff Jake. I have sent my representative, the Estimable Barrister PawPaw, to represent my interests in this pursuit of justice. I come to you with a relatively simple case. The Wish spell. Yes or no? Ever since I was a young 3.5E Wizard aficionado with big dreams of ever getting to cast even a 7th level spell, I have read the 9th level spell lists with a sense of wonder and awe. Time Stop. Power Word Kill. Meteor Storm. But all pale in comparison to the might and versatility of Wish. A couple years ago I wrapped up a five year campaign that was the first time I have ever played high level D&D. It was a great campaign! Both the DM and the party are all dear friends of mine and that campaign holds a treasure trove of cherished memories. If I were to have one complaint, though, it's that my DM banned the Wish spell. His argument was that it's simply too versatile and unpredictable to keep it from breaking a campaign, my argument is that I'm a cooperative player who would be fine talking through uses of it and taking 'no' for an answer. I even offered to only ever use Wish to replicate the effects of 8th level and lower spells, one of its tamest uses, but to no avail. To a certain degree, I understand my DM's position, because while I genuinely am a cooperative player and view D&D as a collaborative storytelling game and try to universally 'lean in' to story beats, I also aspire to Axfordian levels of using spells in unexpected ways to make my DM panic. Few things make me as happy as that wide-eyed nervous chuckle and an utterance of "You're going to... what??" Having the entire selection of 8th level and lower spells in the entire game at my fingertips is a godly omnitool for Creative Surprises. On the other hand, let me cast Wish, damnit. I've wanted that spell for twenty goddamned years! So, I pose to you the question. Has my reach exceeded my arcane grasp? Should Wish stay, well, something I Wish for? Or is my DM a dirty bastard who should let me cast the most kickass, badass, iconic spell in the Wizardly arsenal? I await your judgement.

I place myself at the mercy of Dice Christ (or perhaps in this case Card Christ) and their holy disciples, for I have sinned. I have recently in the last few months, at the behest of Priestess Emily, taken up Magic: The Gathering. During my friend's birthday recently, I played my first game of IRL Commander and in my opening hand was a land search card, which I played on my first or second turn. In my 100-card deck, I pulled a land and played it, and we moved on to the next player's turn as I reshuffled the deck; however, because the stack of cards is so large, I split it into multiple parts to shuffle, then put it all back together. At the end of shuffling, I looked down and had no hand of cards in front of me. I had indeed shuffled the hand into my library. Not wanting to embarrass myself and/or halt the game, I told no one and discreetly drew the number of cards I thought I had left in my hand. I've since kept this dark secret to myself and not told a soul, not even my wife, who was also learning and playing Commander for the first time. I await and accept whatever damning you see fit.

To the Honorable justices Axford, Murphy, and Tanner and my favorite guest on 8 bit book club, Jake. I bring the case of the Orc Wizard who was slain by a mind flayer. In college I played in a 7 person campaign as an Orc Wizard, Grug. The issue came about 5 sessions in when our party encountered a mind flayer. We found the mind flayer guarding a holy sword (think Sword in the Stone) which we were sent to retrieve. After a grueling fight with many party members going down trying to pull the sword I finally made my over to the sword and low and behold rolled a nat 20 to draw the sword from the stone. Then in a shocking turn of events I rolled a second nat 20 to crit with the holy sword (which the dm allowed with the nat 20 to pull it from the stone). The mind flayer lived and one of his minions knocked me out allowing him to eat my brain. Another player in my party hit him on the next turn killing him. The DM then revealed that he only had 1 hp which made me question why the mind flayer stayed in the fight as opposed to fleeing after being knocked so low? Several members of the table brought this up since a good bit of the party was downed the Mind Flayer could have easily escaped on its turn instead of taking me down with it. My question to you is: Should the mind flayer have taken me down with it or turned tail and fled upon being crit to 1 hp taking into account it is a very intelligent being. P.S. For the record I have grown since then as a player, but my orc wizard only had 6 intelligence and could only cast magic missile, so I probably deserved to die at some point but was then truly deserved?

To the best dang court on either side of the missiouri. No major case, just wanted to give a shout out. After years of listening to you guys have just the best time I finally got to run a one shot with my family over the holidays. Good times had by all, including my brother interrupting the villian's monologue to cast Tasha's hideous laughter. My sister splitting the party and almost getting them all killed 20 minutes in. My brother in law nailing the death knight chasing them at the end with a clutch push from his heavy crossbow so the party could rescue the downed monk. And special shout out to dice christ blessing my 10 year old daughter with the killing blow on the resurrected, but still kind of a giant skeleton, green dragon and giving her the solid nat 1 on the encounter table I wrote up so I could trick them all with the classic "little girl running out of the house is secretly a giant spider." Can't wait to find out what kind of shenanigans you all get up to in 2026. P.S. Your new DM screen worked great, love the design.

To the highly regarded justices Murphy, Axford, and Caldwell and of course my favorite bailiff Jake This is a confession that I must make lest I be cast down to dice hell! This was a recent offense but alas I dare say for a good cause but it still causes me great shame. My cousin just joined our dnd (not a quiet cousin) and this was her first real go at dnd. The session was good but my son lies in a false roll my cousin rolled on dnd beyond and failed a save but then rolled her real dice. The Dm didn’t notice and the second roll was a nat 20. Now hear me dice Christ my cousin just went through a break up and she really needed the small win on her first game but I have forsaken myself in this lie I humbly await forgiveness to unburden myself from dice hell

Happy New Years justices and Jake. In a 5e campaign that crashed and burned years ago, we had our party barbarian get killed pretty brutally and I’m still not sure it was buttoned up. I, the party’s cleric, had cast water walk on the party to cross a river. Our barbarian sprinted across the river before our perception checks revealed dire crocodiles in the water. Naturally, barbarian gets chomped and pulled under water. The barbarian- for I think three rounds straight, succeeded in their strength checks to break the grapple. I argued that because of water walk (which specifically has a speed at which you get sucked back to the surface), the barbarian could have gotten to the surface for a breath or escaped. Our DM disagreed. He ruled that every time the barbarian escaped the croc jaws, the barb couldn’t get far enough fast enough and the croc was able to attack with an attack of opportunity- trapping the barb again in its jaws. The rest of us fought the two smaller crocs and watched in horror as our barbarian was described as drowning as the crocs buried her body into the mud and tore her apart. Sucked as my first experience with campaign party death. The table argued about this death literally until the campaign itself died. Murph, lover of rules and up-buttoner of things, please help me put this question to rest.

Most honorable justices, and the slightly less honorable but oft maligned bailiff. Today I present you with the case of the Guardian of Faith versus an the definition of an enemy. I'm in a long-running campaign of Undermountain, playing a halfling war cleric. We've been fighting several drow nobility, and the previous session before the new year we were exploring and found a group of halflings trapped in a cage. A group of drow burst in and fought us, trying to target the halflings. Then we came into this next session and we saw a drow, and my character waved, and then they ran off. We ran after them and stopped them, but they managed to get a warning to another group of enemies down the stairs. We decided to try to lure them up rather than go and face a possible ambush. I cast Guardian of Faith at the very top of the stairs to act as a choke point, so anything that tried to rush us would have to go through that. The drow sent a troglodyte up the stairs. I pointed out to my DM that once he was within 10 ft, he would have to do a dexterity save. My DM said no because the troglodyte wasn't an enemy. He argued that because the troglodyte wasn't actively engaged in combat with us and was simply a scared monster being forced by the drow, he wasn't approaching with hostile intentions, and so the spell wouldn't recognize him as an enemy. I think that's bullshit. So I argued back that my character has no idea what the intentions of the troglodyte are. She would have no reason to think that this creature wasn't approaching with hostile intentions and it's my spell. The DM then made a parallel, saying that the troglodyte was like a scared child. That was a ridiculous comparison and it just felt like he didn't want my Guardian of Faith to do the damage. Ultimately I said fine and kept it moving because, at the end of the day, what the DM says goes, right? So then a bird flies up towards us, and I point out that it still has to make that dexterity saving throw, and the DM shoots back that the ceilings are high, so the bird is not within 10 ft of my Guardian of Faith, even though it is a large creature. I didn't argue this time, but i was getting angrier. The troglodyte ran away and our barbarian attacks and kills it. She starts to feel bad because of the out of character hints that this troglodyte wasn't all bad and The DM then tries to make her feel better by saying it's basically a dumb lizard, and I pointed out that earlier he had compared it to a scared child. He ignored me and the fight continued with a few other troglodytes trying to come up the stairs and a drow wizard firing from the bottom. To make a long story short, we exited combat without my guardian of faith doing any kind of damage to any enemies. There's the possibility of enemies below since we never went into the ambush I suggest we rest because the Guardian of Faith will last for 8 hours, and we could at least get a short rest in for cover some hit points, but then the DM shoots back that we need to be sleeping in a more secure location and we go back to the surface. The session ended shortly after that but I was just so frustrated. We had just had a tough fight, and I had used one of my last higher spells to cast this Guardian of Faith, only to be told that it didn't get to do anything and wouldn't even protect us while we tried to rest. So I ask of you, am I wrong to be so frustrated? Should I bring it up with my DM? Is the definition of enemy b*******? Or, more accurately, should enemy be defined by the creature's intentions or by my interpretation of the character's intentions? Also, is the DM really trying to nerf my Guardian of Faith, or is all of this very legitimate points that he had? I throw myself at the mercy of the court, and I will humbly accept any result.

To the ebullient, estimable judges and the bailiff we tolerate, I bring a case of missed olfactory opportunity. I dm a party who recently fought an aboleth in its lair. I seriously considered putting jugs of water from my freshwater aquarium around the table to help set the mood. At the last minute I chickened out and figured it might be a bridge too far. After the battle I casually mentioned what I had almost done to gauge their reactions. Two grimaced but one player gasped and whispered under his breath “total immersion.” Judges, should I have given in to my impulse to do too much in the name of immersion?

To the Palladian justices and the effable bailiff, I present to The Case of the Evanescent Assembly. I have been playing D&D for almost 2 years, and been a DM since the very beginning. I have played only a handful of games as a player, and one of them was 2 months into my D&D journey, and consisted of myself and my brother (who live in Ireland), and my cousin and uncle (who both live in America). My uncle was the DM, and had been playing D&D since THAC0 was a thing, he was even making money as a DM on Roll20 during COVID. Suffice it to say, I was ecstatic for this game, and put a lot of work into my character and making myself and my brother available for games. It did not take long for me to see the ephemeral nature of my relatives. After organising sessions weeks in advance, they would frequently just not join the call to play. Once they didn’t show up because of a planned doctor’s appointment, another time because they simply forgot. My brother and I only cancelled one session and did so at least a week before hand. My relations would also never instigate planning a session, relying only on me to send the “When are you guys free next?” message. In an effort to salvage the group, I offered to DM a spooky two shot where the players were killed by cultists and revived for a day to get revenge (single day revenants), but we only got to do the first session before the two yanks bailed. I do not hold a grudge but I do feel marginally salty that one of my only instances of being a player was cut short by their lack of effort or engagement in this game. Is my melancholy warranted or should was should I be more grateful for the moments they were there. I humbly await your judgement.

to the deacons of the dice, i have a confession/request for advice. i was called in as a pinch hitter for the second (and final) part of a friend of a friend’s call of cthulhu game based on a pre existing module. it was very last minute (within an hour of the session starting) as the original player was unexpectedly unable to attend and the gm needed someone to run this character. i was more than happy to join but realized, after agreeing and receiving my character sheet, that this was a module i had read for fun on my own time after playing with this group previously. what would y’all have done in this situation? i didn’t reread anything prior to the session but certain things, including some puzzle answers and crucial plot moments, were stuck in my mind. i tried to take a backseat but there were things that my character was uniquely equipped for and i worry even in trying to be realistic with myself about my own puzzle solving abilities/what i would’ve been able to deduce that i may have stolen some moments from other players. no one said anything and everyone seems to have had a good time, with the final battle being appropriately tense and deadly, but i still wonder if i should’ve been upfront with the gm/rest of the party about my knowledge.

To the mighty and divine holy speakers of dice: Christ and the sin-eater alter boy Jack. I wish to relieve my burden of fudging my stats block roles. You see, I play in a high-level Ravenloft where we were asked to, instead of doing 4d6 and dropping thw lowest, we did 3d8, so we had a chance of getting a 24 to a state. This also makes it more possible to get lower states. Everyone in the party got crazy-good rolls; the barbaion doesn't have a state lower than 12. But me. This was my result 7 str 12 dex 10 wis 8 int 9 con 14 cha Im playing a warlock, so I'm already a glass cannon. Please forgive me for not being the weak link in the party and for having them warring over my character's safety during battle. So I fudged my charisma to a 22. Being a hexblade would at least let me stand on my own in fights and help with any persuasion checks, but I still feel dirty playing this character. How can I make this guilt go away Ps hate the show, never watched it

To the honourable justices and that's it no one else, I present the case of Screw You Guys, I'm Going Home. I was playing in the finale of a four-shot with a rag-tag group that formed at a drop-in DnD night at the local board game store. One player (the Warlock) knew the DM, but I and another player were strangers to them and each other. Long story short, in the climactic fight, the Warlock turned on my character, both literally and figuratively stabbing me in the back. I was knocked into saving throws... for about 5 seconds, before I remembered that the DM had gifted me the ability to force a reroll on any single roll through divine intervention. I asked if I could use it for this attack, and he agreed. The attack missed. I asked the player "What the hell was that?" out of character, but she refused to explain herself. So, knowing that the Warlock was betraying me, I (being a druid, and at death's door) told the other character to join me, turned into a giant eagle, and flew us both the hell out of there, leaving the Warlock to die and the quest incomplete. The DM and Warlock player told me after the session, out of game, that they had this whole deal between the warlock and her patron that she needed to "kill" a party member to become powerful enough to defeat the BBEG, and that she planned on healing me right after dealing that blow. The end of the session was kind of awkward as a result, and we didn't play as a group any more after that. Was I in the wrong to react the way I did? Or was the warlock for engaging in unprovoked PvP? Or was the DM for orchestrating the whole situation? I humbly await your judgement.

To the paragon of cleverness, Justice Emily, the paragon of whimsy Justice Tanner, the stalwart bailiff Jake Herberts, and the soon to be canceled Justice Murph (#LetTheWifeWormSpeak) Today I bring you the case of the aggressive pacifist. Me and a group of three friends I found online made a discord dnd server and had a solid year and half running campaign. The DM asked if his new girlfriend could join the table, which we all agreed to. She introduced herself as a cleric of the goddess of peace, who has sworn to never stand by at the sight of harm onto others. It sounded neat...except that non violent pledge apparently applies to us as well. When we were investigating a local gang to take out their leader, she insisted that we could talk it out with him. We were attacked by several gang members that heard us because of arguing with her on this point, and a fight breaks out. She uses her spells to try and stop the fight, including commanding US to drop our weapons and talk it out. She even healed the gang member that the barbarian attacked after I got crit on instead of healing me. Eventually we manage to wrestle the baddies down to arrest them, and the rest of the party agreed that our viewpoints differed too much to adventure together, so we either needed to make a change or go our separate ways. The cleric insisted that her faith was absolute, and all violence was evil without exception. So the barbarian states she's out. The rogue agreed, and I joined in as well. The session ended there, and we tried to talk it out with her that maybe she could make a different character for this party if she still wanted to play, or maybe we could make a side campaign where we all play peacekeepers to go along with that vibe. I even offered to DM. The cleric player said her characters faith would never waiver and stormed off, leaving her mic on even, so we ended it there. The following week, we started the next session...where the DM narrated us being arrested by the town guard for vigilante justice. We were taken to the guard captain, that explained he had received complaints on us taking the law into our own hands. The rogue tried to explain that we were only trying to handle the gang leader because her backstory involved her parents being murdered by this guy and she wants revenge. The guard captain agrees to let us continue our quest...but with a supervisor to keep us in check. Cue the cleric joining in again, smugly stating that she is now in charge of the party and we can either obey her commands or go to prison. An argument broke out for nearly half an hour and ended with us leaving the call and ending the session. It's been two weeks since then, and we've tried talking it out. The DM states that he wants his girlfriend to feel warmly welcomed and included, but we argue that this was not the way to go about it. We're still willing to play with her, but not as her lackies. Dear justices, were we in the wrong for not bending our characters philosophies for her? Or should I give up on continuing this campaign, which has been fun until this point?

To the most honorable judges and that guy sitting in the corner over there. A few months ago, I was running a short campaign, mostly with people I haven't played with before. One of the characters was playing a noble, helping support a revolution (the game's plot), so his family could receive glory and acclaim. This was a character archetype I suggested when first meeting everyone, and I was down for a morally gray character, but in play he leaned a lot more towards evil. At the first session, he showed some concerning behavior, like having his attendents be child soldiers 'as a joke', that nobody laughed at; and he definitely manipulated an important inebrieated NPC and seemed a little proud of it. Throughout the course of the game, his behavior was kind of similar, doing things like insulting dangerous NPCs and trying to get that previously inebrieated NPC to marry him to increase his status. This nearly culminated at the finale with another party member trying to cut off his hand, which is when I finally pumped the brakes and got everyone to stop, chill out, and work together for the ending, which really put the behavior in perspective for me. Should I have done more to curtail this player's behavior earlier, or does fault solely lie with him?

Dearest justices, Axford, Tanner and Murphy, I come with a simple case, the tweet. During our most recent session our Bard made a comment about tweeting something, we all laughed and moved on. Later however, he asked how many likes his tweet got. Confused I asked what he meant, he said, as I hadn’t corrected him, that in world he had tweeted. I said obviously not and he was being a fool. I thought we had moved on but the vibes have been off since, he seems genuinely a little annoyed and sad. Justices was I wrong for not shooting something so crazy down in the moment. I await judgment.

To the wise and fair court and the esteem-fluid Bailiff, I bring you a case of self-important overstepping. 3 of my coworkers wanted to learn to play DnD and I LOVE teaching people to play. I've written a semi-on-the-rails tutorial module that I use to introduce people to the game that speedruns them through level 1 to 5. A 4th coworker, who we'll call Greg because that's his name, is a much more experienced DnD player but wanted to join. I explained that this was going to be much too basic for someone like him, but insisted that he could help teach the other players. I relinquished. We had a session zero where I walked the newbies and Greg through level 1 character creation and scheduled our first session. The day arrives, and Greg shows up early. He gleefully tells me that he took some time to "optimize" the other players characters for them. I asked how much optimization a level one character could possibly have and he said "Wow, you really don't know DnD that well, do you?" The game got started and as I ran through the module, Greg kept interrupting me to explain things to the group, even after I told him to hush. At one point, my newbie fighter went to attack a bandit and Greg loudly proclaimed "WRONG." I stopped the session and pulled Greg aside, and after a brief conversation where it was clear he was planning on steamrolling the whole session, I asked him to leave. He argued but did eventually leave. However, now he's constantly talking trash about me at work, telling other people that I'm a psycho control freak and that I couldn't handle having an alpha at the table who knew more about DnD than me, and has managed to get me kicked out of my longer ongoing campaign with some other coworkers where I'm a player. Judges, was I wrong to boot this boundary busting bully, or should I have let him stay to keep the peace?

If it may please the omniscient judges and the bastard baby baliff Blake, I present the "Backstory Coup de Grace". I was playing in a 5 year long campaign with friends set in a distopian theocracy where healing potions are illegal and healing magics are closely regulated by the ruling church (you can only be legally healed by paying a tithe to members of the holy order). My character is a homebrew dragon born paladin/Warlock who was raised in the church but rebelled because she wanted healing to be for everyone. As part of a recent arc in the campaign, my party went up against an inquisition led by my PCs childhood best friend/surrogate brother, Ashe. We stopped his army to protect the city they were attacking and downed the leader/my brother, but as my character grappled with the moral choice to spare Ashe or stop him once and for all, one of my party members, the rogue, made the decision for me and attacked him twice (in initiative), taking all of Ashe's saving throws. Enraged, my PC lashed out at him (as an opportunity attack) as he ran away with our third party member to another part of the ongoing battle. My PC ended up staying behind for the rest of the fight to use her last spell slot to revivify Ashe and have a heart wrenching scene where she tried to convince him that he's being brainwashed. While this ultimately did not affect the greater campaign arc (death doesn't really stop the enemy when the enemy is made up of power hungry clerics), it majorly affected my PCs relationship with the rest of the party. The offending rogue justified it by pointing out all of the atrocities that Ashe had committed throughout the campaign (we were level 10 by that point), including razing an entire village for not believing in his diety. Plus he definitely had developed a personal grudge against Ashe by that point. While as a player, I mostly understand his choice - Ashe is a bad guy and deserved to die and will deserve to be killed again - I can't help but feel like my PC was cheated out of an epic personal moment at the climax of a grueling battle. If he had let me make that choice on my own, I feel like our party cohesion would have solidified and my PC would have gained the resolve to do whatever it takes to bring down the corrupt church. Instead, she feels a little aimless and resentful. So, esteemed judges, should the rogue be punished for sneak attacking my surrogate brother before I had a chance? Or should I accept that that was his fate no matter who dealt the killing blow?

o the honored justices and Jake who in 2026 I have heard is a good man so far, I was playing in a Cosmere RPG(Based on Brandon Sanderson’s novels in the Cosmere universe) game system is irrelevant. My friend Vinny GM’s and it’s just me and one other friend as players. We ended up in a sleepy tavern and the crime boss suggested we play a card game, setback, which we all enjoy IRL. But we played 2v2, and Vinny had both of his teams his hand, in a game where you can’t tell your partners your cards. I pointed this out and he accepted the razzing, but would it be fair if he steal some of his ice cream? Please I am hungry.

To the honorable justices and.. Oh hi Jake, yeah we are just getting seated and aren't ready to order, but some waters would be nice. I bring to you a "retcon" case. My party plays in an Eberron campaign and were trying to break up an arms deal between two rival gangs in a seedy bar. The party soon discovered that the BBEG is also in the bar to try and steal the weapon for themselves. The warlock of the party went to try and run interference but as he approached, I told him to make a Wisdom saving throw, as the BBEG was casting Charm Person. We'd been playing a long time and I thought it would be a fun cliffhanger to not let him know the result before we played next. My player was frustrated but agreed. We ended the session and were packing up our things when he said "Wait I minute, I have Counter spell!" and proceeded to make the case that he would instead being attempting that at the beginning of next session. I did relent and allowed him to cast it the next session, even though I was frustrated by the manipulation of the timing. The party laughs about it now, but judges, how far does the long arm of the retcon reach?

To my favorite justices, bailiff, and also Caldwell, whose spirit infected my friends and inspired the following fuckery: I am dm’ing a fae wild campaign for my best friends who I love. One PC, Carl, decided that he NEEDED a snow globe with the four seasons inside. He bought a regular snow globe, broke it open, used trash from a dumpster to create the decorations, and cast the mending spell to tie it all together, insisting that he could also keep all the water inside the globe because he was just that fast. I told him to roll sleight of hand with disadvantage as Carl had no crafting experience, nor tools! He insisted that he should actually get ADVANTAGE because was using mending. I told him that mending would have been fine if he was just trying to fix a snow globe. But he had instead filled a broken snow globe with trash, so this check was about how well could execute on his “Seelie Snowball.” I feel like I must have gone wrong because after much grumbling he rolled two sixteens— an ominous rebuke from dice Christ. Justices, should have given him advantage?? Was I too harsh on my best friend’s bespoke snow globe making dreams?

Forgive me dice christ for I have sinned. For the past fives years I have DM'd a western marches campaign (separate parties playing in the same homebrew world) with my friends from high school. We have always played on a semi regular schedule and the campaign has become the main way my friend group socializes. Last summer we all had major life events happening so we decided to take a break. Things calmed down and everyone is ready to play again, but in the ensuing months I found myself less stresed not hav to worry about scheduling sessions DM prep, and juggling my time around it. My friends are excited to start playing again and hanging out but I'm struggling to get the juices flowing to get back into. Can you forgive me for my slothful ways and petition dice christ to help me see the light againm

Jollies and Jimjams to the jacked judges and the jorkin jerk Jake; our party of 4 was on a side quest to upgrade the sword of our Eldritch Knight. We had to make our way up a volcano to get special ore in order to replace the materials being used for the upgrade. My stealth archer build ended up meeting their demise towards the end of the side quest and we had to rush back to a temple for a cleric. We made it back to the outskirts of the village that we initially received the quest in, and our Eldritch Knight goes “oh wait, I could just do this…” and summons back his now sword. The rest of the party kinda side eyed, but didn’t really hassle him too much. I think he ended up picking up on our “wtf” reactions, because he somehow went down during a somewhat easy fight and said he had to step back from D&D for work conflicts. We later found out he joined our DM’s exes D&D group. So judges, we’re justified to feel a little miffed about how our fighter ended the side quest? If we knew he could do that, we might’ve suggested it from the beginning. Or told him not to do it so the blacksmith guild doesn’t get mad at us.

To the unquestionable judges and the little baby*fart sound* uh oh stinky!*wet diarrhea fart sound*, bailiff Jake. May it please the court I bring you the case of the Whining Spider. I have a player who consistently makes poor decisions and then complains about the consequences. The first being when he was a Giant spider who ate the heart of an eldritch god as a goof and then their boss was annoyed at him for making a dumb decision. Most recently I had an Ancient Nightmare dragon NPC who he started being minorly rude to. As a consequence she briefly trapped him in a nightmare as flavor for an intimidation roll. No other consequences. However he then said “that sucks, your mom sucks”(the dragon is a PC’s adoptive mother). I said “do you actually say that out loud?” And he says yes. I couldn’t justify why she wouldn’t outright kill him so after much deliberation we as a group decided to not derail the entire adventure and just say it never happened Yet a few days ago he complains again that he didn’t even do anything wrong. Please provide your judgement so we can be done with this. If I am deemed to be at fault I prepare myself for execution

To the honorable Judges of the court of crit and archbishops of the dice Christ because we do not believe in the separation of rolls and rules. And also Jake who is around. I bring you the case of the fucked up cleric. About a year ago I played in a one shot that turned into a campaign (or at least it was suppose to). It was a VERY magic heavy setting so everyone was at minimum a half caster. We played this over zoom, and I had play with all but one of these people before. We all had slightly problematic but OP characters, for the bit, and we worked well as a dysfunctional family. That is except for the unknown player. He played a cleric who had a personally built customized d100 table of different drugs and their effects. When he wasn’t under effects from a drug he was suffering withdrawal and he was insufferable. Not contributing to the party and actively taking away from the narrative. On MANY occasions he would take a drug that would fully incapacitate him and just expect us to carry him through a dungeon. It was funny for the one shot, but as the campaign drug on (pun intended) the drugs seemed to get worse. One was that his healing spells had the opposite effect so instead of a healing word he did a harming word. Once during a withdrawn, outside of combat he randomly attacked a PC because he “needed the good stuff”. I tried to voice a complaint but he just steamrolled his addict cleric in no matter what. The campaign later fell apart, not exactly because of him, but many other players shared my frustrations, so it definitely had something to do with it. Judges, am I wrong to be frustrated with this character and this player who refused to help us in what was a really incredible campaign (with one of my favorite character I have ever made) or was he on another level of character creation/commitment that I have yet to reach? I await your verdict. P.S. Emily thank you for being the greatest D&D player of all time I will follow you to the end of the earth

Good afternoon esteemed judges and the measly shoe shiner I neglected to tip. I will keep this brief. My party was fighting a devil in a warehouse while using a battle mat so we could see where everyone was standing. The devil used an ability at the end of its turn that allowed it to escape to another plane before reappearing in the next round (similar to Haarlep in BG3 if caldwell knows what I’m saying). The DM stated that they mentally took note of where the devil would reappaear so we could ready actions to attack when the time was right. We strategically spread out and readied our actions in ways that covered the entire warehouse besides one specific square we couldn’t reach, but the odds of the devil being on that one space would be astronomcially low, so we moved on with our turns. Lo and behold, a miracle occurred! On the devil’s turn, it popped up on exactly the one square where nobody could attack it- essentially wasting all of our turns. We absolutely squashed the devil, making this entirely petty and trivial, but it still made a few of us say “oh come on dude” out loud at the table. Should I just sit contentedly and accept that the DM had a stroke of cosmic luck and chose the exact right space or am I allowed to be a bit salty at this forced gotcha moment? I eagerly await your ruling and please tell the shoe shine boy that he missed a spot

To the sweet justices and the beautiful, cherubic bailiff, I bring you the Case of the Overpowered Character Backstory. I am finally playing in my first DND campaign, and for my first character, I thought it would be fun to play a ‘wizard’ who had lost their magic. My idea for her backstory was that she had essentially been a level 19ish Wizard who had used the Clone spell as a backup plan in case she was killed, but someone sabotaged it and her new clone found itself unable to use magic of any kind, forcing her to start over. (Mechanically, I would play her as a Battle Master Fighter) My intention was not to have an overpowered backstory! I just thought it would be funny to play a character who was in their peak physical condition but constantly yearned for the ‘good old days’, back when they were a feeble old lady! My DM liked the idea and said I could do it, but another longtime player at the table vehemently disagreed, saying it would be unfair to have a character who had been so high level in the past, even though I explained that I would not be casting spells at all! Ultimately he seemed to think it was a bad character and I didn’t want to rock the boat. I rolled up a more standard character who I am having fun with, but I can’t help but think the first one would have been fine! I ask the court, was I overreaching with my character backstory, or was my fellow player overreacting? I humbly await your decisive judgement

Dearest judges and Jaliff Bake, I present to you the case of The 2:00am Vampire. A few years ago (during the height of COVID) my buds and I were playing D&D online. Our friend, let's call him Sassafrass, is not our normal DM, and was giving our forever DM a break by running his first one-shot with us. It was fun! Unfortunately, Sassafrass entered a Blood Addled Flow State (and has super real ADHD) and lost track of time.. until 2:00am. Justices, none of us knew what to say! Sassafrass was doing a good job! We wanted to be encouraging! But none of us could work up the cajones mention the time! It's all water under the bridge now, but we love to rib Sassafrass about it every chance we get. His vampire, it's important to note, said "Blehhh!" a lot in a really nasal tone of voice. Anyway, is this a wrongful razzing, or are we, the weak players to blame? I think about it all the time. Cheers!

To the honourable judges and the mentionable bailiff. May it please the court to hear the case of the dialogue tree PC. I joined a campaign that a number of my friends I'd played with previously were in. I ended up creating a character that was very direct and literal in speech - he had no problem being completely honest about his less than legal background as he simply didn't recognise lying or speaking tactfully as a potential course of action. One of the other players' character had a very high charisma build who - judging from the state of the story when I joined it - had become the de facto "main character" of the campaign. The player was much more experienced than a number of other party members, so this wasn't really the issue. The problem was they kept trying to roll insight and persuasion checks against my PC to get him to "open up more" when a) the characters had only just met, and b) he was a very "cards on the table" kind of guy. It felt like being an NPC in an RPG while the player tries every option in a dialogue tree, and left me feeling frustrated that they were refusing to engage with my character on an equal footing but they argued that I had to give them something "more" because of their high rolls. Am I correct to ignore what would be great persuasion checks in any other circumstance, or should I have come up with something more to say? I humbly await your judgement and advice.

If it may please the grandiloquent Justices Axford, Murphy, and Tanner, as well as the ever virtuous Bailiff Jake. I present to you the case of the Self-Inflicted Mousefolk-In-Distress. Around 5 years ago, I was in a campaign with an 6-person party. A Rogue/Wizard, a Ranger, a Druid, a Monk, a Warlock and a Bard. The bard was a mousefolk, who was the size of an actual mouse, and the player role-played them as a dewey-eyed musician who had a secluded life up until they decided to adventure, so they had a very naïve outlook on life, including but no limited to: being a pacifist, and believing that problems can be resolved through talking just like they did in story books. While I personally really enjoy that kind of archetype in a character, the ways in which the player chose to navigate that in-game constantly and consistently conflicted with the party's desires and goals. For example, we were once in the feywild, and in this world the DM established that the demigod of magic created the feywild and assigned her 8 disciples, each specializing in a school of magic, to be an archfey that ruled over specific parts of the realm. Before going into the feywild, we were warned by the demigod of magic that some of the archyfey were chill, while others - especially the archfey of Transmutation - had gone a little crazy while living in the feywild and we should steer clear of them if possible. Once we got into the feywild, we ran into some of the chill archfey who had also warned us that the archfey of transmutation was coo-coo bonkers and that we should stay away from him as much as possible. Later on, we found ourselves needing to pass through the territory of the mentally unstable transmutation archfey, and we needed to strategize how to pass through unnoticed, be as uninteresting as possible, and not be polymorphed by this archfey and be trapped in his realm forever. Also, did I mention that this archfey was a tabaxi? With that in mind we as a party collectively chose to have the most "normal" looking people in the party (Half-Elf Rogue/Wizard, Wood Elf Ranger, and Tiefling Warlock) pass through the realm loudly on horses as distractions to draw attention away from the Mousefolk Bard, Tortle Druid and Dragonborn Monk while they stealthed. We prioritized keeping the Mousefolk Bard away from the Tabaxi Archfey for obvious reasons, to which the mousefolk bard vehemently protested. The Bard insisted that they could just talk to the Transmutation archfey and he would let us pass through. We reminded the Bard about the large amount of warnings we were given to avoid this specific archfey, but they weren't having any of it. To settle this, we put it to a vote amongst the party, and the majority ruled in favor of our original plans. 3-in favor, 1-against and 2-abstentions. While we were putting our plan into action, the DM described the mousefolk jumping from the Rangers pocket to the Monks pocket. Seemed normal enough until the distraction team got confronted by the archfey. While we were talking to him trying to talk our way out of the situation, the archfey started to get angry, claiming that he was hearing a whistling noise and accusing us of making it to annoy him. We were all confused as to what he was talking about, almost chalking it up to him being crazy like we were warned about, but as it turns out, the mousefolk bard was blowing a magic whistle we had received earlier in the campaign. The way it works is you think of someone, then blow the whistle and only the person you think of can hear it. We only figured this out because the bard had come out from behind a tree holding the whistle, revealing that they had used illusion magic to trick us into thinking they went along with the plan and was texting the DM separately that they were doing all this. The Transmutation Archfey polymorphed themselves into a Roper and immediately grappled all of us. We were all level 5 characters at the time so we had no way of fighting an archfey, let alone one that could polymorph himself into a roper, so we narrowly escaped the roper's grapple and had to flee immediately while also staying out of range of polymorph. While we were able to get away with no one being killed or polymorphed, this infuriated everyone in the party. We all understood not agreeing with the decision of the majority, but the bard going out of their way to lie and deceive us with magic to do what they wanted and placing all of our characters in danger left an incredibly bad taste in all of our mouths. We tried having a conversation about this in-character, and the Bard seemed remorseful that their actions put us in danger, but they never apologized. I wish I could say this was a one-time thing but multiple times throughout the rest of the campaign the Bard would do things that placed themselves in danger without telling anyone in the party, forcing all the PCs to stop what they were doing and start trying to rescue this fucking mouse. We tried having multiple coversations mid-game about this and the player/mouse never learned their lesson, and in fact, seemed to enjoy forcing all of the players to stop whatever they were doing to go and rescue them. It got to the point where this practically suicidal mouse put themselves in danger often and when the majority of the party said "Well you didnt tell us that you were doing this so we wouldn't know to come look for you and rescue you." the Bard player got mad saying "Are you just going to let my character die?" and we all felt bad and reluctantly went to go save them. Eventually, the campaign died out without a proper conclusion but I still find myself incredibly irritated by this character to this day. I'm getting mad just writing this. So, tell me Justices, we were too harsh for failing to give a shit about this mouses escapades? Were we infringing on player agency by putting our party decisions to a vote? Should we have just let the consequences of the mouses actions catch up to them, even if the player was begging us to save them? I leave it to the discretion of the court.

To the illustrious judges and their AI bailiff-bot Judy, About two years ago, my good friend - let's call him Jimmy - invited me to join in his D&D campaign. I had been wanting to play D&D for years but never had a group so this invitation felt like a dream come true!! Unfortunately for me, as soon as my character was introduced Jimmy's character was immediately hostile because my paladin worshipped a different god than his. Jimmy joked above table that he would have outright attacked me if he wasn't so low on spell slots. I was able to diffuse the situation, but the tension that lingered between our two characters was zero fun to play out and it was honestly a huge bummer of a first ever session. That campaign fizzled out shortly after, and the beginning of a new campaign felt like a fresh start. Imagine my utter befuddlement when the moment mine and Jimbo's characters meet in this new campaign, his attempts to attack mine. A heated text exchange ensued between myself and Jimmy where he said that he was being true to his character and that it's what his character would have done. Judges, my question to you is this. With a third campaign looming on the horizon, how do I prepare for another potential skirmish with Jimmy's character? Right now I'm leaning towards min-maxing the shit out of my character and prepping for a fight to the death, but I fear this may be straying from Dice Christ's light. I await your wise and impartial judgement.

Happy new year honorable justices and I wish we could have left the Bailiff in 2025. I bring to you a confession of crime and sin. In 2019 I was playing my first campaign with some friends. I played a human bard (you know the type) in the module out of the abyss I believe. The crime in question involves avarice and metagaming. We had passed an island on an underdark lake that had a tomb with a magical sentient sword calling to us named the dawnblade or something similar. Justices I wanted the sword. We were informed of how it wanted to be used by only good aligned people. I had the alignment to use it and I insisted that I was the one to use it because I was the one who pulled it from the tomb and I had the alignment. Looking back it was selfish and a not fun time to metagame. I remember the only argument I had was that their alignment wouldn’t let them use it and that’s not very fun for a first time group. I lay my head at the mercy of the court/church. PS. I serve penance now as a DM for a 2 year campaign with them and I give them lots of items Dunkle Caldwell style.

To all honored members of the court, but especially Emily, I have been playing dnd with a group of guys for about 2.5 years now. They are some of my closest friends, and I love them all dearly, and we rarely experience conflict. The case I bring to the court is more of a personal dilemma. I am not our regular DM, but I am currently trying my hand at a short campaign. (Judges, this shit is hard.) I’m doing my best, and my players are so helpful and forgiving. Enter my “problem player”, our DM’s younger brother. (We’ll call him “Brayden”, as that is his name.) Brayden has a habit of intentionally getting his characters killed once he grows bored with them. For reference, he had gone through 7 characters before I joined their campaign at session 43. (At that point, we wanted to start recording our sessions, so our DM put his foot down and made him commit to a character. However, he has continued this habit during our Curse of Strahd campaign.) Enter my campaign, set in an enchanted forest. His character concept and backstory were exciting, and after our session 0, I planned Easter eggs and a couple of possible “endings” to our story for each character. Brayden, however, after one play session, has already shown signs of trying to off his character. Our group jokes about it, but personally, I am not amused. It doesn’t feel like he is taking big swings or trying to interact with my world. He’s just being reckless and not caring about the party or the stakes. I found myself wanting to shut down his ideas to keep his character alive. We’ve played 2 sessions, and I’m already over it. I don’t want to be a railroad DM, but I also don’t want to reward this insane behavior. Typically, when I begin to doubt myself as a player, I ask “WWEAD?” (What Would Emily Axford Do?), but in this instance, I am at a loss. Do I let my player get his character unceremoniously killed so he can make a new one whenever he fancies, or do I stick to my instinct of making us play this story out more authentically? I throw myself at the mercy of the court (with special consideration to the opinion of Justice Axford).

Dear Honorable Justices Axford, Murphy, and Tanner as well as the questionable but endearing court baliff Jake. I bring to you the case of the dead civilians. This was several years ago during one of the first campaigns i'd played so i was still pretty new. I was playing as a Cleric and the party was in a church when a fight broke out, the crowd immediately started panicking and fleeing. During my turn i casted an AOE spell (i dont remember which one) on a group of bad guys, the DM asks "Are you sure?" This of course gave me pause, but i couldnt figure out WHY I wouldnt cast the spell. I spent 10 minutes going back and forth with both the DM and my own party trying to figure out why this was a bad idea, but they refused to tell me so i gave up and did it anyway. Lo and behold, there were still civillians in the church and I ended up killing 5 innocents and injuring another and this ended up affecting how the rest of the town treated us. The rest of the party gave me shit for this, but i had thought all the people had fled the church and while i dont necessarily blame the DM for not telling me, should my party have at least helped? I leave this up to the court and will abide by your rulling

May it please the bailiff, as this is a very business-focused case. I’d like to share an argument that happened at my D&D table when I was at business school in Vancouver, BC in 2022. I was running a campaign for 3 girls who were in my financial accounting class. Since I knew these girls liked money, I made sure to fill my world with lots of merchants, and made sure each player tracked their own coin purse. My currency system was simplified and was as follows: 1 gold = 10 silver 1 silver = 50 copper The issue arose when my party arrived in a city with a large gold mine & gold coin minting facility that had been taken over by an organized crime group. In response to the mine being taken over, the local government had temporarily suspended the use of gold coins in the region until production of the coin mint was resumed. I had hoped this would encourage my players to defeat the bandits so that they could walk through the city as heros and freely spend their gold. Instead, my players insisted that the limitation of gold coinage was government overreach and patterns of economics would naturally lead to the formation of a black market where 1 gold coin could be sold for more than 10 silver, with buyers hoping that the value of the gold would increase due to the disruption. Justices, I took economics, and they are correct that this would be a possibility. Instead of fighting bandits, they wanted to find a silver dealer who would buy all their current gold coins, then they wanted to leave the region/province and swap those silvers for more gold, return to the besieged city, and continue their exploit. I said “No, that’s a good idea, but no.” and they’ve never let me live it down. Should I have allowed this exploit? It admittedly would’ve been pretty fun, but I just got flustered in the moment.

To the indomitable judges and the abominable bailiff, I bring to you the case of ‘Did my very first PC deserve to die in order for my DM to inject his DMPC?’ This took place over a long-form campaign during Covid. The party was working as an investigative team, and had split for the evening after my wild-magic summoned a creature that then ransacked our items. Every player lost magical items to this creature, myself included, all of which was by the DM’s choice and discretion. We stayed in character, and in-character the party split for the night, leaving my character to drink alone by the docks. That’s when I noticed a strange figure, and was given an option to follow it, so I did. Turns out it was a vampire, on its way to meet other vampires, who destroyed me in one round, and murdered without death saves being allowed. Following this, my DM asked me to make a new PC with strict guidelines as to the personality, abilities, spells, outfit, demeanor, intentions, alignment, and when/if the soul of my original PC would be recovered, I would then turn the DMPC over to the DM. Judges, am I wrong to think this was too much? I await your judgement in the shaded peace of new friends, a new table, and years of personal growth. P.S. we never recovered my PC’s soul and the original group disbanded. Alcohol was a factor.

Hello to the authentic, brilliant, and charming Justices Axford and Tanner, and to the awe-inspiring, brave, and cunning Bailiff Jake Hurwitz. Oh, and that fourth guy, Bradley Munchy, I guess. I present to you, the case of the unnoticed stolen Nat20. This case stems from a moment in an online game when I was sparring with an NPC who viewed my Dragonborn barbarian as his better, but, mechanically he was much stronger than me (To note, I had a +2 in STR, and was level 3, and this character had 2 attacks). During said spar, I was missing most of my attacks when, low and behold, I finally rolled a Nat20! I was elated! I finally got a hit in, and a crit to boot! But then, our party sorcerer cast silvery barbs, and, while I still hit, the sting of losing a Nat20 still hurt my pride. But this is not where my issue lies. My issue lies in that, later, when I role played having noticed the sorcerer cast the spell on me, so that losing my Nat20 wouldn't go in vain, and there could be a story beat about it later, the DM claimed I hadn't noticed it! I protested, saying that she hadn't casted it secretly, nor did she use subtle spell. The DM then made me retroactively roll to notice the spell be cast on me, and of course I failed, leaving my Nat20 to be absolutely useless, combat- or story-wise. Was I wrong to think my character would have noticed a flash of silvery sparkles, and that it could be a good bonding moment later to reconcile over the slight PvP? Or is my DM correct that the spell was cast discreetly and my barbarian was just a dunce in the heat of combat, leaving the Nat20 wasted? I humbly await your verdict, and if I am found guilty, am ready to accept my punishment.

Hello illustrious justices and—woah. Hey Jake, you're looking good, have you been working out? I have been GMing my first pathfinder campaign, and to get my footing I elected to run the beginner's box Otari adventure (the same as you all!). When my players reached the Kobold's dining room, they quickly dispatched all the Kobolds resting there but one—who surrendered. My players then began arguing about what to do with him. Whether to knock him out or tie him up, etc. After several minutes I asked them to roll a perception check against this Kobold's stealth. Justices, they all failed. I described to them how, as they were arguing, they look up to just catch the tail of the kobold slipping away out the door to the entrance. However, my players all protested, saying that it shouldn't count because they weren't arguing in character. I relented, and took back the rolls and actions, and since then this kobold has joined the party as the (unplanned) GM PC chasing his dream of starting a sex club in a metropolis. Justices, was I right to have him roll to escape while my players bickered, or does table talk pause the entire game world?

To the Venerated Dice Elders, I present my confession, which stems from a powerful moment in a late-campaign fight, with a high-stakes fight where we *had* to take a Dragon down to aid the rest of the fighting forces. We were well spaced out to avoid breath attacks and got it to the brink. However, the Dragon knocked the Fighter prone as a Legendary action, and then used its full turn to dash-fly away, leaving it 200 feet away from us. We had no attacks that could hit in that range. The Fighter was sure she could finish the fight if it had stayed in her face, but there was no chance of that now. Fortunately, I was playing a Trickster Cleric / Rogue Mastermind multiclass, and was exactly 60 feet away from the fighter! I bonus-action dashed to put a hand on her. Then, with a Jens Lyndelle-worthy flourish, Dimension Door'd both of us onto the back of the escaping Dragon! I immediately got yeeted off by the Dragon's Legendary Action to a significant but non-lethal amount of damage, but the Fighter stood strong, got their turn, and took the Dragon down with the last possible attack. I can still hear the roars of the table when it happened. ...But here's the confession: Forgive me, Dice Elders, but I was *65* feet away from the Fighter. I had enough turns to sit there, plot out this epic plan, and realize I couldn't. Nevertheless, when it was my turn, I went with it anyway, sliding my mini across the board to the Fighter. Normally our DM watches move distance with diligence, but I think the fact I only needed to move in a straight line concealed the slight of hand on my part. No one else at the table was any the wiser. It was a huge moment at the table, but I acknowledge that memory comes with an asterisk, and that it looms in my brain enough that I think about it every time a Dice Christ comes up, so I figured it was time to atone. I humbly await your whomping.

Dice Christ Take the Wheel, for I have sinned. I have DM'd for a campaign for the past 5 years. And I fudge rolls. I only do it when the character deserves a huge win or is trying to pull off something cool. But the last time we played, our Rogue went into a Vampire's lair alone and got caught at the dead-end on the other side of the exit. Nearly a dozen spawn came rushing at him, clogging the pathways to his escape. It was a hard fight to get through the crowd, so I fudged a little. I let him get through a few more vampires than I should have, just enough that he had a chance to get out but still could easily fail. But then my Wizard said, "if the Rogue gets out of this, you're going too easy on us, DM." And I couldn't let that stand. Not because he was wrong or rude, but because I was called out and it was embarrassing. So I stopped fudging. And the Rogue died. Thou Holiest, we're almost at the end of the campaign. I didn't want my player to lose a character that he's been playing with for five years to die alone, ripped apart by vampires on the cold stone floor. Especially not one session after he was accepted by his family and took his late father's title as Lord of his ancestral House. I know that fudging is wrong, but should my Rogue have to die for my sins? I lay myself at your little toesies, at your mercy.

Highly revered justices and Jailiff Bake, I bring you the case of Literally Being Pushed Over the Edge. I've had the privilege of playing in many D&D campaigns, and always with at least one of my three older brothers. In one game a couple years ago, my oldest brother was at his usual antics. This meant repeatedly going off on his own or against the party's wishes. The premise of this particular character was being so extremely lawful that he simply couldn't go along with what the rest of us were doing, if it was nefarious in any way (which combat, heists, and general D&D shenanigans usually are). So, when we found ourselves in a mage's tower, having selected one of four portals to enter single file, at the last minute I shoved my brother's character into a different portal and passed my sleight of hand check to hide what I'd done. My middle brother, the DM, turned the shocking moment at the table into a great story opportunity for the evicted character to come back in the next session, secretly as a shapeshifter in disguise. This was right up his alley and it all worked out, but did I go too far? Seeing as how other players were more gracious and mostly just rolled their eyes at my brother's behaviour, I wonder if I just let real-life frustration seep into the game. Or was it reasonable to go PVP against a PC who was so unrelentingly oppositional to the party's goals?

Hello. This Friday, my character had an enhanced sort of home brewed disguise self to infiltrate a Drow camp and discover the location of a weapon. At one point, I was asked to roll deception. I rolled a 27 as I have +10 to deception. My DM said “you sure about that roll?” Feeling weird and nervous around a bunch of hostile, high leveled drow, I said “…..yes?” He then narrated the Drow asking my character “Why are you lying to me?” My character naturally reacted by exploding a spell, stabbing the Drow, and retreating as quickly as possible. At which point my DM cackled “your roll was high enough. That’s just something she asks people sometimes!” Beloved court. My character was then beset upon by the camp, is currently bloodied, and gathered no information on the weapons location. I feel pretty dirty about this and I feel like my DM sought to punish me for my great roll with a cheap trick. Or is this fair because Drow are famously tricky and mistrusting? Note: I was disguised as her father figure. Thank you for your just and merciful ruling.

For CAKE HURWITZ! Two years ago, in our weekly campaign over Zoom. One of our members was getting bogged down with work and at the end of a session told us that he was leaving. At the beginning of the next session Our DM role played his wizards death, we mourned, and moved on. That same session we were sneaking into an evil church’s courtyard which ended in a TPK. After the game our DM revealed that this was supposed to be an easy encounter that was geared twards the wizard and had lumped the enemies together in large groups at the beginning of the fight to make full use of his AoE spells. But our wizard told the DM he was leaving after he created the encounter and didnt feel like changing it. So i ask the Judges, Should our DM have switched up his battle tactics to better suit that of a Ranger, Barbarian, and Rouge? or did we just get good ole fashioned whomped? either way no shade to our DM! LOVE YOU MIKE!!!! (ps. im writing this the morning before our final fight with the BBEG! GELATIN, URSAI, and MAYWIN WILL BE AVENGED! TIAMAT DIES TONIGHT!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

To the honorable judges Tanner and the Axfords and to jake who is here I bring you the case of the insane robot I ran a Star wars campaign a few years back using SW5e and it was a lot of fun, during character creation one of my friends (who is known for making insane characters) asked to play a droid specifically a magna guard barbarian, I hesitantly said yes. Com session 1 he had 6 reactions, resistance to all damage and 36 AC. was in fact concerned, this was a level 10 campaign but that's crazy. He explained that it is perfectly legal the rule book is just easy to abuse I said you have 22 AC and vulnerability to shock, he said that's fair and we had a blast, judges since the have razed him on it and he has exclaimed still that it's legal, so ask shall keep razing or is it just the systems fault? p.s. he said he's down to send an explanation of his build

To the justices who smell oh so good, and the bailiff who also smells, i present the case of the Searching Soldier. I was DMing for a group of coworkers. It was the last session of a 6 game mini campaign. On dragonback, they flew to the main castle which was being destroyed by the BBEG and his army. Once there, a human fighter decided instead of using his turns to fight the BBEG, he would instead "park his dragon" at a window of the castle and search inside. Mechanically, the castle had 6 towers which were being destroyed at different intervals depended on damage done to the castle as a whole. On his search of the room, he rolled a nat 1. On his next turn, despite the fact that a tower had already fallen and it best he help in the fight, he searched the next room and rolled another nat 1. The party encouraged him to help fight, desperately, and he refused. For the rest of the round, he remained in the castle narrating himself searching and never rolling above a 5 and never participating in the fight. So when the hero's won, without his help, I decided that in the epilogue the townsfolk would commemorate the heros who saved the day with a statue, the party minus the fighter. Months later i would find out the party was collectively glad i did this, except the fighter who was upset. He said he kept searching because he "thought i didn't have anything planned for the interior of the castle." i did. not to lore drop, but the fighter would end up dating a coworker half his age and quit because "nobody accepted their love." she dumped him the day after he quit and no one has spoken to him since. But still, I ask, was i wrong to not include him in the epilogue when he had been there for the rest of the journey?

Dearest bouncing baby Bailiff and the rest, I present the case of DM vs Ghoul Wannabe. We started a new campaign pretty recently with some friends who had watched D20 and engaged with DND online but never in person. One of our players decided to be Cooper Howard from Fallout. However, our DM is running a high magic campaign set in the far wild. He told her this character wouldn't fit and she's insisted that her gun can have some flowers on it or something. The gun she chose is super overpowered and when we've attempted to nerf it we're accused of 'singling her out'. As the typical forever DM, I've been trying to support our new DM but I think we need an outside opinion to get her to save The Ghoul for a different game.

I beseech the boundless wisdom of the trinity justices and the resplendent, ever diligent, steadfast ballif known as...uh...Jeff? I bring you the case of the Persistant Parrot Player. A while back I was planning to dm a campaign with some friends from school. One of said friends came to me with a character idea of a hyper intelligent parrot piloting a humanoid mech suit. I was elated by such a delightful idea until he pitched the idea that the suit and parrot would function as 2 sepletate characters. Each fully speced as a parrot wizard and automaton Barbarian. I tried to offer other solutions such as a robotic familiar or homebrew some kind of hybrid class but he would not accept anything less than the dynamic duo. Tell me oh wise ones. Was I right to uphold the rigid programming of the game that would help this automation run smoothly? Or did I clip this parrots wings unjustly? Your phone has no bars.

To the honorable Crit Justices and… I bring to you the case of Resurrection Debt. I was playing in a campaign with some new college friends in a party of around 6-7 players. I was playing a neutral good paladin who was just let out of jail after wrongfully being accused of murder. In our first encounter, the warlock was jumped by some thugs. As we fought, I made sure to deal non-lethal damage and wouldn’t kill them. As the final thug ran away after I cast Command, our rogue (themed as a shady Russian spy) shot him dead. My paladin got upset and berated the rogue for shooting someone as they ran. I took the crooks body to my god’s temple and got our whole party in debt for thousands of gold for the spell. From there, our party had to give a portion of our loot to the debt from my church. The party was a bit upset, and the rogue just thought the murder was funny, but I felt like killing a fleeing thug in a city street was a bad look and it’s what my character would do. Was I in the right? (P.S. The thug came back as a Halfling and immediately converted to my god :p)

To the jubilant justices and the baleful bailiff, I have a case that may not be in your jurisdiction. If it is not, please feel free to send me to bear hell where I belong. During my first week of grad school I made 4 four fast friends (2 men and 2 women). During that getting to know you phase we were having dinner and discussing interests. I mentioned that I loved dnd and the guys exploded with excitement. Our other two friends were decidedly less interested. I can’t remember exactly what they said but it was something in the ballpark of, “that’s really dorky.” Flash forward a year and a half. Me and my guy friends have been playing dnd and having a ball. We don’t bring it up in casual conversation but everyone knows that we do it. One night, after a party, one of our female friends is really drunk and (without preamble) turns to us and says, “You know I play dnd too. I could have played with you.” She then walked away and never brought it up again. Justices, I need to know: was this the proper way to try and join a campaign or am I justified in my disbelief and confusion? I throw myself at your feet

Esteemed justices and honorable bailiff (are we being nice today?), I bring you a saucy case of deception and infidelity. Or maybe it’s actually a confession? I’m a player in a campaign that’s been going on for several years. The group was all strangers who are now pretty good friends. But there are gameplay issues surfacing that we can’t ignore anymore. The DM is thoughtful and hardworking, but has a railroad-y style that is devoid of almost any RP. The high of leveling up or landing a critical hit is short-lived and can no longer distract from the monotony and lack of immersion in the story. So one of the other players and I conspired to look for another group in secret. And we found one. It was D&D magic - NPCs with distinct voices and personalities, descriptive and flavorful combat, emotional investment in the story… it’s everything we wanted. And the next time we played in our original campaign it felt even more unsatisfying in comparison. Are my friend and I going to burn in Dice Christ’s Hells for cheating on our long-term, faithful campaign? And even more so, for enjoying it so much? Is it unethical to stay with our original campaign now that we’ve experienced what fulfilling D&D feels like? I throw myself emphatically at the mercy of the court and church.

Dearest Clergy of Dice Christ. I write to you with a confession, i am playing in a long running game with my best friends and my husband. My husband is playing a warlock named Hal lelujah praise-alot (Hal for short) and I a Paladin named Blair. We were playing one night and our party was about to be TPK'd. Now, before this, we were in a hallway and I casted a fire bolt at him because he was being a dick. We where fighting a smoke dragon ans two of the players were already down and my husband was at 10 hp. Me being very beefy was doing okay but we all needed to escape through a black hole. All of a sudden my husband goes down getting hit with the EXACT amount of hp I hit him for previously. He would have stayed up if i didnt hit him before. Now for some context, our characters playfully hate each other, like full on despise each other. At this point I'm panicking, not knowing what to do. Im 30 feet away from him and can't get to him in time without taking an opportunity attack. In a fit of joy, I realized I have the spell aid, which can be casted from 30 feet away. I proceed to cast the spell he proceeds to get up and make it through the black hole. Here's where it gets bad, and I will take any punishment or penalty you thrust upon me... i didn't realize I didn't have an open spell slot I was completely out of spells. When I realized it, it was about five minutes later and I said nothing. From this point our characters only hate each other more and mending that has been difficult, i prostrate myself in the name of the church. Thank you for your wisdom

I come before the most honorable justices and the jacked yet pathetic baliff with the case of the unwanted NPCs. Simply put - the players in my current Dungeonworld campaign don't give two hot damns about anyone else in the world. Most games I've run I have to be very careful about how compelling I make any human, bear, or sentient candlestick else the group will want to adopt them. However, thus far I've failed to captivate my players with: a meek but well intentioned halfling girl posessed by a shadow god, an outcast orc striving to uphold the virtue they were named after, and a gruff dwarvish pirate inventor with a heart of gold. The only NPC they've cared about is a half elf brawler that I said "Looked like Brad Pitt in that scene where he's shirtless in Fight Club". Should I just give up and make the game super horny if that's what my players want? P.S. per your last ruling against me, I did eat a tablespoon of Mustard Custard and it was more vile than you might imagine. This was despite my plea being read before Dice Christ, and Deacon Axford saying I "didn't really do anything wrong". So, thanks, I guess.

Hello Holy Crit of Awesomeness, including Jake, I never knew of D&D until I got a job at Taco Bell years ago (I no longer work there). My co worker would tell me about his home game he DM's and I would have basic small talk about the craziness that would take place... Until one day. He stopped talking about it all together. I inquired about the game and he told me I wasnt allowed to know because there was a big arc coming up and I was friends with some of the players in said game. Didnt think anything of it and moved on. Weeks pass, I inquire again and he lost his mind. Dude thought I was conspiring with the players and telling them his plans to completely womp him. (which I never did, Dice Christ as my witness) My question from this situation would be should I have not shown so much interest? Should I have conspired and made his weird fantasy real? I bow to the court

To the honourable Justices and bailiff who deserve a break for the new years I guess I bring to you the choice of a willing spel failure I play a dwarf wizard baker who is flavours to be just bad at magic and when he tries spells the first time they often backlash and have for close to a year of play. Typically I pop the DM a message, make sure he’s ok with how it fails and if he doesn’t give the ok then I just cast it as written. We encountered something in a fae portion of the adventure than pulled bad memories (from the back story and the dm messages ahead of time to gather these) and during the encounter I messaged him to ask if I could use a chain light night spel and since it was a melee creature roll a save for my own character since he often doesn’t do offensive magic. The Dm agreed. This monster was described specifically as reaching out and grabbing/making contact with my wizard while we both stood in water and so I rolled damage, we both failed the save and took a bunch of damage This felt narratively great despite eating damage. This however infuriated a player. This player full stopped the game to argue this wasn’t how the spel worked. A break was called while these two spoke and 10 minutes later they came back and dm said I wasn’t going to take the damage to avoid upsetting this other player I ask the justices, was this a fair call? When I asked him afterward citing it felt incredibly wrong to reverse this to appease a character who wasn’t hurt, and was just upset because I “ wasted my chain lightning spell slot and we might need it”

To the most honorable justices, and my burpless brethren the baby bailiff. . . Blake? May it please the court and give you all the most supreme crit. ;) I'd like to submit the case of the quiet Kenku. My table was running a home brew campaign and we were getting close to finding and fighting our BBEG. Our party included a kenku, Crowbar, who played by the mimic rules that he could only repeat words and sounds he had heard before. The BBEG was hidden away on another plane and to get to him, we had to enter a cave full of grueling puzzles and traps to reach a portal. We barely made it through alive. At the end of the cave, our DM announced that we would be silent and communicate only in written form or telepathically, (though no one one in our crew had the message cantrip). We were presented with a written riddle (think "speak friend and enter" style puzzle). Part of the riddle was solving for the answer, the other part was determining who could say the answer. If we answered wrong, or the wrong person spoke we were told the reaction would be TPK bad, and we were very weak already from the cave. We sat around the table passing notes, and determined the answer to the riddle was "Onomotopoeia" and the person to give the answer was a choice between either the youngest member of our party, or the physically smallest member of our party. The problem? Crowbar was both. Crowbar vehemently insisted there was no way he would have heard the word onomotopoeia before and therefore could not speak it. Our DM knew going into this that Crowbar was both the smallest and youngest and seemed to be gleeful about our predicament. After several pleas to both the DM and Crowbar to try to find a loophole we conceded we could not solve the puzzle currently. I suggested we take a long rest, exit the cave, teach Crowbar onomotopoeia, rest again, and come back, as it seemed the only solution. In the process, we ran out of potions on the way out, and on the way back our cleric, the party's only healer, went down, and she failed her death saves. My hexblade warlock attempted to call upon my patron for help without success. In the end only 3 party members of our 6 member crew, including myself and Crowbar made it to the end concious. Crowbar triumphantly said Onomotopoeia and the gate opened. Our session ended feeling empty and hollow. In real life there was a fight after the session. The players expressed we were upset at Crowbar for being so stubborn and at the DM for intentionally putting us in this situation. Crowbar argued that's how his character has always been and we shouldn't expect him to change because of a bad in game situation. The DM argued that we could have been teaching Crowbar words throughout the campaign before this so we wouldn't be here. I said it was an intentionally obscure word and we had no reason to teach it. Our DM laughed at me for being so upset, so I got up and left with the cleric, saying we were going to start a new campaign. Later, Crowbar texted me and said I had overreacted to a simple difficult scenario, and that if that's how I reacted when things didn't go my way, then no one would ever want me in their dnd party. I feel justified in being mad, but wonder if I didn't react too strongly. So I come to the mercy of the court asking, was I wrong to take the Murph response of "find new friends" or was my DM being unreasonable? I humbly await your judgement and accept whatever punishment I may receive.

Hello Bailiff Jake. I present the case of the DM vs the Right Honourable Justices of D&D Court. I am not the DM of the game in question, but as one of her players I am standing in as her legal counsel. This was a couple of months ago during a dungeon crawl style game. We were on a roll, so instead of stopping after completing two floors of the tower as usual, we decided to keep going without taking a Long Rest. We took a 30-45 minute break for food during which the DM statted a monster of an appropriate level, using Spinosaurus stats. The fight began with the monster dealing 20+ damage to each of our three characters, and so during her first turn, the wizard cast Hold Monster for the first time, which immobilised the Spinosaurus. Long story short, combined with a Bane from the cleric (myself) and some unlucky rolls from the DM, this meant that the Spinosaurus never got to take an action, or one of its many Legendary Actions in four rounds of combat. We all had a good laugh about this and it was a hilarious, if anticlimactic, ending to a great night. However, the DM lamented that the Spinosaurus had no Legendary Resistances, a feature which has been described as demoralising and spell-slot-wasting by one of the judges of this very court! The charge is levelled towards Judge Emily Axford for disparaging the noble Legendary Resistance which would have saved this poor Spinosaurus from an undignified end and our DM from getting whomped. PS. The DM introduced me to the show and Emily is her personal D&D hero, so it's not real heat, I promise.

To the wise old judges and baby bailiff: I bring to you a case of the ladder and the rescued horse. In my first ever D&D campaign, I had a horse named Swamper. It wasn’t a familiar, just a regular horse. The DM did not like my horse at all, probably because my character’s name was Swampy and they didn’t think the name overlap was cute. At the end of the final battle, we were trapped in a giant hole at the end of a dungeon. The only way out was a ladder on the side of a 100-foot obelisk. The DM said that Swamper wasn’t going to make it out. I begged my fellow players to help. The barbarian offered to carry Swamper up the ladder on his back. The DM said he’d have to get a nat 20. He did. The DM begrudgingly let him carry my horse on his back up a 100-foot ladder, but complained about it A LOT. I think this is fine as barbarians are strong. Am I right, or should I have accepted that my horse lives at the bottom of an obelisk now?

Justices and Jank, here’s a quick one. I previously DMed a homebrew campaign that I was really really into, but I had to step away because I realized that my enthusiasm and play style weren’t matched by the players and it was hurting my feelings after every session. Not their fault, no long-term hard feelings there! It’s been a little over a year now and I’d love to start DMing in this world again with a better-matched party, but how do I do that without hurting my former players’ feelings? They’re all still good friends of mine, and only one of them is currently playing in any other game. Thanks, love ya, kisses, etc.

May it please the honorable judges and the bailiff who can join if he wants to, I guess. I come here with a case of a stolen character. Our party was facing extra dimensional beings when they possessed more than half of the party, resulting in an effective TPK with the remaining members either dead or knocked out while the possessed characters ran off. My sorcerer, who I loved playing, was one of the possessed players. The DM had us make some temporary characters to go rescue the possessed PCs. He even gave us some tools to help bring them back, like a dagger made of a material that we were told could end a possession with mere skin contact, and rings that prevent psychic influence. Finally, after almost a year, we have found the missing characters. The problem is that the items we were told would rescue them have not worked. The dagger caused barely a shudder in the possession, and the ring did nothing when placed on my sorcerer's finger. More than that, the story has somewhat stalled as the party has no idea what the next steps to take are. Judges, I'm at a loss. I miss my character, she was one of the most fun I've ever played, but I feel like she's being unfairly kept from me. Am I right to feel slighted? Should I trust that my DM has a reason these items don't work, or am I justified if my temporary character causes some mischief just to move the story forward?

To the honorable and gracious judges and the equally gracious( if not said often enough) bailiff Jaq. I present the anxious DM. I am about to start my very first DM journey with 6 friends that have never played D&D. I've listened to all of the D&D court cases and feel I've got an ok grasp on how to potentially handle situations however I'm still inexperienced with actually running a story, as you've all run a campaign I'm hoping I can get a little advice from each of you on how to make sure I make each of the players feel seen and excited to go through this journey. Any advice helps. Ps. Listening to your podcasts inspired me to finally take the leap from modest player to aspiring story teller.

To the mediocre judges and the high prestigous balof i bring the case of the goblin fish i was running my first dnd campeighn spelled it wrong but idc anyways i was playing with my family i was a new dm so i accedently gave my granpa an overpowered item i tried to make it harder by boosting the monsters hp but. my grandma said "i tell it to leave us alone" i said she cant do that realy because its a giant fish she said "but its a goblin fish i speak goblin" i decided i couldnt argue and said dc 20 she failed and defeated the monster instead everything was fine and we were all happy but i still feal bad (ps the fish was not a goblin fish nor did grandma speak goblin)

Good Morrow Emily, Murph, the other one, Caldwell today I posit a simple query: When is hand waving okay? I was playing a campaign with some of my friends and we were going from one part of the map to another side of the map with a teleportation spell, in our haste a player neglected to mention what happens to her mount, a mastiff. After teleportation she remembered the Mastiff and asked politely "could he have came with?" The DM, who is her partner, Said no moreover, because you did not explicitly say what you did with him The Mastiff was just roaming out and about I looked around the party in complete shock trying to gauge others reactions to this and they seemed nonplussed but obviously the player was quite frustrated and was asking If she could have just boarded him, for 10 five gold or something like that, he advised that she has to use all of her gold, which was around I think 2,200 gold for boarding post de facto. I regret not speaking up in the moment but didn't want to get in to a fight with the DM. judges what do you think, was this overkill for neglecting a mastiff or was this justified for forgetfulness?

Should I have let my players use “Hold Monster” on a vehicle that I described as a “Monster Truck?” It was just a regular run-of-the-mill monster truck, not a beast-vehicle-hybrid, but I felt like I’d been caught on a technicality and let them have it

To the Honorable Supreme Court Justices Murphy, Axford, and Tanner and also that one guy I guess, I present the Case of the M.I.A Player. I have been with an online D&D group for 5 years now and it has gone very smoothly for the most part. Recently, we've been struggling quite a bit with scheduling, possibly because we're cursed but more likely because we have a very large party with 7 players + the DM. We tend to play on unless we're missing more than 2 players or if it's a particularly important session. Everyone has been happy with this arrangement and understood that if they cannot make it to the session, we will go on without them. One player, J, has been particularly bad about missing sessions and often does not give notice until 5 or so minutes before we meet. This has been frustrating but no one really complained about it. One session, it seemed like we were going to have everyone there for the first time in a while, but after almost 20 minutes of waiting for J, we realized he would not be showing up. We played without him and, though the DM had not planned anything super important, we ended up taking some pretty campaign changing actions. Almost 3 hours after the session had ended, J sent a message in the discord that simply said "Sorry. I had a date." The next session, J was there, and when we explained what we had done without him and he was very clearly hurt. He asked us why we would have made such big decisions without him and we told him that this is how we've always done it and that he has missed important things in the past, just nothing of this magnitude. Our group is slightly divided on this, 5 of the players as well as the DM think that if J doesn't want to miss important things like this, he should try to be present more frequently. J and one other player think we should try to avoid making such important decisions without the entire party present. I am somewhat conflicted. Though his poor communication and frequent absences have been frustrating me, J has been my friend for 5 years and I also know if the party had done something so important while I wasn't there, I would be upset. So I ask, should J be punished for his lack of communication and constant skipping? Or should the rest of the party be held accountable for making serious decisions without him there?

To the most exalted justices and the most eviscerated bailiff, I appear in court today to advocate pro bono on behalf of another in need of justice. My friend's boyfriend's sister's boyfriend was recruited to play in a DnD group by a guy who was teaching him how to lift at the gym (charging $1200 for three sessions, should the court find this relevant). The guy DMed for the group, and the Boyfriend had never played before. In their first session, the DM looked visibly upset after Boyfriend introduced his paladin character and ended up killing him mid session, saying afterward that they hated the character and instructing him to make his next character a fighter. Boyfriend kept playing with them, but recently the DM asked if they could play on Wednesday instead of Saturday. Boyfriend said that would work for him better anyway, and after being questioned by the DM said it was because he had a conflict that Saturday. The DM decided that it was unacceptable that he would have wanted to prioritize real life, cursed his cat, kicked him out of the group, and blocked him. Prioritizing DnD has not previously been an issue in this group, as during a recent session they didn't play until hours after the start time because some of them were playing Magic the Gathering instead. Your Honors, I implore you to deliver justice for this innocent new player, lest he lose his spark for the game just as quickly as he discovered it.

To the honorable Justices, and like, I guess Jake too. A few years ago I was taking my first shot at DMing a Pathfinder module, during one session a character sent their familiar to check for traps, in my excitement I accidentally forgot to give the familiar a check before cutting it in half with a saw, killing it. The player, rightfully called me out, but, not wanting to be a pushover I stood my ground. Later in the campaign the player came across an Imp, and the table revolted and forced me to make this imp, who I gave the worst voice possible, the players new familiar. Was this turnabout fair play, or should I have reconned the killing of the original familiar. (I know it's that, and I await my just punshment)

To the honorable justices and I guess also Murph’s DMPC “Jaek.” I present to you the case of the Difficult Druid and the Bleeding Bard. I have been in a campaign for four years with four level 8 PCs: a wizard, a monk, a druid, and me, a bard. We are all great friends and there is no bad blood here. Anyway, our dragonborn druid refuses to wild shape and instead hangs back to use acid breath or the spell Wind Wall. ONLY Wind Wall. As the only PC up in the mix, I get absolutely rocked. The wizard takes hits so I don’t have to, and the monk has stopped using evasion. To add insult to injury, we all watched the DND movie together and when the druid in the movie wild shaped, our druid said, “that’s so cool, I wish we had someone who can do that,” to which I responded, “you can turn into a fucking bear.” I prostrate myself before the court and ask if we should get over our tank not tanking or if we should trap our tank in a wild shape a la Tobias from Animorphs. P.S. don’t play, hate the show

To the respectable Bailiff Jake and whomever else may be present, I bring to you the case of The Double Standard for Old Men. My close friends and I are in a years long dark fantasy d&d campaign. A few years ago, our party was heading into a fight it seemed likely could be my characters last. So me and my DM discussed possible back-up characters I could play in case of the worst. I pitched an ancient, 2000 year old, treant man, who guarded over a small village for untold centuries before it died out, and departed to find his missing elf wife before she was set to pass of old age. My DM said that my character was "too old." since a large part of the campaign center around a mysterious dark age our characters cannot have lived through, lest it spoil the mystery. I argued that he could have been totally unaware of any political machinations happening in his time. Since he was so old he could have spent the whole dark age simply walking through the woods on his way to join the campaign. But my DM still objected. I accepted her ruling, assuming some unknown twist of the dark age would have made it impossible for my tree man to stay ignorant to its nature. And besides, my main PC ended up surviving the fight so it didn't end up mattering anyway. Until that is, a few months later, when another one of our friends joined the campaign. His character, a ridiculously old tree man, who had spent untold centuries walking through the forest, completely unaware of the mysterious dark age he had lived through. Justices, every single aspect of my character that the DM rejected was present in this new party member. When I confronted my DM about it, she basically just said "Yeah whoops, sorry" and moved on. Its been many years, and this usurper tree man is now a well beloved member of the party by all, including me. After all, it's a fantastic character concept. But Justices, am I right to be annoyed by my DMs blatant hypocrisy? If my PC dies, do I have the right to play as a 3rd, even older tree man? Or should I simply respect my DMs right to change her mind and let it go? (PS: both me and my DM are fans of the show, so if your punishment is physically possible, it is likely to be enforced in real life.)

To the benevolent judges and "AHHH!!!".....Oh Jake! I didn't see you there. I bring you the PC Custody Battle that still makes me doubt that I should DM again. I was approached by my forever DM and he asked if I could run the next campaign so he could play. I was nervous cause I've never DM'd before, but with his encouragement I gathered the group and we set off. The game was going well for a few months until my DM approached me. My DM asked if he could make a new character claiming, "I'm bored, I feel I have taken his story as far as they can go." I was worried cause I still had so much planned for him and even offered to workshop, but he was firm. So I narrated how his PC left the party and introduced his new character: a swashbuckler rogue pirate captain with crew and ship he created. Everyone loved the new character, so I thought we were all good. Untill one session later, my DM approached me again saying quote, " Im going to leave the game. I'm finding myself bored and uninvested." Once again I was worried and offered to workshop, but he was firm so we bid him farewell and we continued forward. But I had a problem. I was left with his Captain and crew of his NPCs that was taxing for a new DM to organize. So in the next encounter, I decided to introduce my BBEG and as a way to show off the bad guys power, I would have the Captain sacrifice himself so his crew and the players could escape. When I told my DM this, he was upset. Saying that it was his character and he should get to decide what his ending was. I argued that since he left the game, they were now a NPC and as DM their fate was in my hands. Well suffice to say this soured the group and the campaigned fizzled out. So I ask, who owns a character once a player leaves the table? Should I have let his 2nd PC sail into the sunset? Or was I allowed to give him a heroic death? I throw myself at the mercy of the court.

Greetings Venerated and Exalted Justices and Mighty Bailiff Jorp. I bring before you today the case of the ‘Ai Asset Assault’ I am a longtime DM and a passionate illustrator. When preparing a campaign I like to hand draw my world maps, aerials of cities, and various NPCs/ Enemies. However several of my players are also DMs, and we swap out as needed. Well the next friend, who is particularly soft spoken and not very self confident, took his turn as DM. When we started, I quickly realized that all his assets were Ai generated. I did not want to cause a stink because it isn’t my campaign and I know that his particular art skill is more in line with masterfully painting Warhammer models of every shape and size. But when he replaced my self made character image with his generated one, I couldn’t help but be upset. Now fast forward to the start of my campaign where my friend, who sits closest to the dm screen at the table, now generates any description I give of any NPC/ location/ or even special enemies that I most of the time have already on display from my own hard work. Justices, how do I approach a conversation with my friend, and convey to him that when he shows off his Ai images at the table, it makes me lose my mind?

To the honorable supreme Crit Justices and the lowly baliff Jorts (okay that should give you a few seconds of laugh break, listen closely, I've attached a key to the back of this letter. It unlocks the cuffs holding you to your high chair, but don't do anything yet. You're going to need some case details to keep them distracted) I bring before you the case of the Rotisserie Abyssal Chicken. It all started when our parties rogue, Bud Hole, died and our Cleric refused to revive them, instead choosing to go find their soul in the 9 Hells (Okay that's a solid set up so you're going to need to vamp now but pay attention, in the crumb catcher of your bib you'll notice several loose DVDs of mostly early 2000s garbage. When I say GO, toss those at the feet of justice Tanner. The ensuing disc flipping will work to distract justice Tanner and Justice Murphy who will need to make meta commentary on the effectiveness of visual gags on an audio platform. You're going to need a bit more detail to keep them distracted) Low and behold Bud Hole rolled a Nat 20 on an athletics check to punch his feet through the bottom of the cart, Oppa Flinstones style, and steal the demons entire hutch of Abyssal Chickens. (Now that the Flinstones has been brought up, Justice Axford should be in the process of boarding a flight to Ibiza to utilize the remainder of her vacation time. This is going to be your window. One more juicy case detail and question and then it's time baby boy. I have a car waiting outside with a duffel of German Franks and eight passports all for one Jork Himwitz. Don't be scared, I know what they done to you. But no more after today. Get ready,) So I ask you justices, should I have allowed my players to use chronomancy magic to rapidly factory farm Abyssal chickens, thus cornering the 9 Hells entire market on Hellish themed rotisserie dinner products or was I right to pluck their hopes and dreams by besetting them with hot NPCs and a blasting granny? I humbly await your sentencing. (GO WHILE THE BLASTING GRANNY IS HOT!! RUN MY CHILD!) P.S. Tucker is in the trunk of the car P.P.S. Hate the show

To the most honoured and venerable justices of the Supreme Crit, Justices Axford, Murphy, and Tanner, and the Baliff; Tucker's Girlfriend's Ex. I bring the case of the tonal mismatch. Hankering for some more D&D, I signed up for a cool seeing online campaign in a time slot that suited me. (I live in Australia, so suitable times are rare.) The set up was that we were travelling in the Anauroch desert in Faerun, and we knew that the campaign would be an epic one featuring fiends. I came up with a Sorcerer, given power by the old magics lingering in the desert sands, but born into the semi-nomadic Bedine tribes of the Anauroch Desert who hate magic. The other players made similarly appropriate characters. Except for Beef Cake. A Goliath College of Dance Bard, who was aspiring to be a super villain and called the other characters his minions. Apparently this was totally fine with the GM, and I suffered through one session of this unfunny joke character. Was I right to leave this campaign, or should I have stayed to see if the character improved?

To the esteemed justices Axeford, Murphy, and Tanner, and in reverence to the spirits of all past justices: Beardsley, Cartwright, Cobb, Daymond, Farek, Iyengar, LaPetit, Nwadiwe, Oyama, Radford, Shankar, Thompson, Wilson, and Yaffe, I come with an appeal on the rulings of the lower court, and beg for your wise counsel. If it pleases the court, I will be representing myself as the DM in this case, I run a space cyberpunk campaign where one of my PCs has a cybernetic metal arm and leg. During combat they were grappled, and not being strong enough to confidently escape, asked if they could cast heat metal on their own arm. I allowed it, and the grappler took fire damage, failed a con save and dropped the object (aka the PC) ending the grapple as the player hoped. The issue arises in that I stated the player also had to take fire damage, and would have disadvantage in subsequent rounds, seeing as how they are “wearing” their own arm and unable to drop it. They objected, claiming that they could choose to cause damage on subsequent turns and should be unaffected if they did not, while still being able to have the spell available for the remainder of the fight. We debated and ultimately my ruling stood, they took fire damage from the initial casting and dropped concentration as a free action as soon as the grapple ended to avoid any further repercussions. Play continued amicably, nobody got broken up with, virtual tables remained unflipped, but I submit myself to the mercy of the court to review my judgement and punish me if needed. I ask in advance for leniency for the player should you rule in my favor, they do not need to be punished severely, they are a great player and also listen to the show so just an official proclamation that I was right is enough. Thank you for your time and may the three of you thrive in the light of our savior Dice Christ.

To the honored justices and the [remember to insert something nice about the bailiff], I bring to you the case of "Snell and Snass". I've been dming a campaign for a few years and early on our party's cleric ate the big one trying to charge a young green dragon. He was on the fence about making a new character since he was going to stop playing with the birth of his next kid. I offered to roll up a character for him so he could play before his daughter arrived and then I would take it over as an NPC or sunset them. He agreed and the only specifications for a character from his was "for them to be lawful neutral and to support the party in some way". I created Zottun Slatebreaker, a deep gnome college of lore bard that was fleeing persecution from a fascist regime forming further north. He was fleeing with his merry band of entertainers: two Kobolds that were twins and worked together to play a single guitar and a goblin that was pretty moody and played the drums. I created a very simple background for his character and one sentence blurbs for each of the NPCs tagging along, that I would of course play. To make a lawful neutral bard I described in the short background that Zottun is loyal to only his troupe that he travelled with. Justices, my friend did in fact not play the character as lawful neutral. After a challenging fight that included a different PC death and the death of one these Kobolds (Snell) he promptly drew his sword and ran the other Kobold (Snass) through saying "they can't really play the guitar anymore if one of them is already dead, right?" Justices, I mean what the fuck? I knew my friend would play the character how he wanted to, but was I wrong for not absolutely putting this psychotic PC in the dirt? I beseech your honored wisdom.

I come looking nor for judges nor for holy people, but for investors. That’s it torts, GET IN THE TANK! Here's my idea: How many times in media have we seen wizards who fully exaust themselves, to the point of collapsing, to conjure a complex and more powerfull spell? Wizards that put their integritity at risk for a very potent magic? Hence comes my wizard homebrewed subclass: THE EXHAUSTED CASTER ( https://homebrewery.naturalcrit.com/share/wgcImhepmQWR ). This wizard is able to augment their spells with "Exhaustive Boost" options, but, after doing so, they must make a CON Save or get a level of Exhaustion, or even get the Unconsious condition if they fail this save on two subsequent turns. With time, this wizard gets more boost options and gains ways to deal with their exhaustion (this subclass uses the 2024 rules for Exhaustion). For a total of 0 eggs, but Shellmily playing this subclass in a oneshot, I'll sell 97,2% of this idea. But yes, if you insist, I will accept a symbolic number of eggs as incentive.

Dear First Team All-Pro Surpreme Crit Justices and that Waterboy Baliff Jarf, I come to you with a classic tale of DM antics gone wrong (Murph cover your ears). About a year ago I was prepping an Autumn Festival session and was admittedly in a wacky mood. Beyond the normal festival games, I created an NPC who would polymorph PCs into toads for a little harmless fun. As a secret option at the festival I hid a small toad sized hole, which when entered the PC would come upon a sacred seance with tiny toads in witches hats surrounding a pentagram. Said PC would be greeted as the chosen toad-brother or sister whose arrival was fore-toad by Toadstradamus. After a ritual the PC gained a leaping ability and the sworn allegiance of all evil toads. Here's the issue...before all this I mistakenly made the polymorphing NPC a shapeshifting toad, so naturally they swore allegiance to my chosen PC and travels in her pocket. Now my PC has near-unlimited access to toad polymorphs and has used them to get other players out of sticky situations by polymorphing them and tucking them in her pocket. She is amassing a small toad army and I fear there's no turning back. Please help.

To the Gold Medalists in When-Did-This-Come-Out Justices and the Semi-Pro Bailiff Jake, I present the case of the D&DUI: Early in my now 5-year campaign, as a first-time DM, I handed out a Decanter of Endless Water. Over time, I let the players "upgrade" it in different ways. It was too late before I realized they now had a Decanter of Endless Booze that was filled a healing Elven wine. Through the muskiest of DM sweats, I tried balancing it by adding a Con Save to avoid "drunkenness" (poisoned + 1 exhaustion), scaling with the amount healed. Punishing enough, right? Wrong. Judges, my players are always drunk. They pregame every fight with keg stands of their decanter to top off their HP and regularly teeter on the edge of death—not from enemies, but from alcohol poisoning through increasing levels of exhaustion. One nearly died mid-fight by getting 6 levels of exhaustion, saved only by bardic inspiration. So, Judges: Was I wrong to hand them the decanter? Should I have cracked down on their spiraling upgrades? Or should I just let them drink themselves to death while my BBEG stands there like the one sober guy at a rager?

:)

From my girlfriend Kate's game group: To the Most Honorable Justices and the Cool Cool Bailiff Jeff (Geoff?), I have been playing dnd with the same group for about four years. Our usual set up is three players and a DMPC to help balance the party. One of our players was really new to dnd when we started so we tried to go out of our way to cater to them. We let them drive the party choices most of the time, we regularly bent rules that were too complicated for them, and we had to institute a no pc death policy since they found the idea of their character dying really upsetting. This special treatment has persisted to this day. Recently we finished a campaign, and that player asked if he could try DMing a one shot before our usual DM started a new campaign. We agreed, and he told us all to roll level 7 characters. As soon as we started playing it became clear that our Interim DM had not prepared. We were supposed to spend five nights in a haunted hotel, fighting the monsters. Instead we were subjected to a long, incoherent, and confusing shopping episode in the town around the hotel. This happened multiple times and stretched the “one shot” into six sessions. When we tried to go back to the hotel at night to fight the monsters, we were not allowed to fight them. They instead made idle threats but ran away and vanished once the party tried to fight them. And we got the feeling that the Interim DM didn’t have any stat blocks prepped. We tried to be patient since this was the first time he was DMing, but then came the final fight. Despite telling us to roll level 7 characters, he had us fight: a bone devil, two nagas, four skeletons, and four ghasts all at the same time. He kept targeting my Paladin because I was the only one with healing abilities. He never attacked his own DMPC, claiming that he “forgot he could do that”. The fight resulted in a TPK where only his DMPC survived, and the DM was both smug and gleeful about killing all of our characters. Judges, I know that DMing is difficult, but was this unreasonable? He literally cackled when our characters went down. I humbly await your verdict. [Jake, please wait until the moment you think it’s funniest to reveal this] PS: Our Interim DM is my 10 year old nephew.

Okay so I’ll be honest, I do really like dungeon court, but I am almost starting to resent it a little because I so deeply crave a surprise round, please please please, it’s been so long since we’ve seen someone wearing a perfect Grinch costume, hell, it could even be the Grinch himself

Justices, I come to you with a case of practicing medicine without a licence. I'm a DM, and I write little story beats to help with issues people are having One player had a character who slept in a barn and spent all their money buying items from a local merchant he had once loved. He had other people buy the actual items so she wouldn't know he was supporting her financially. I wrote a speech from that character to him where she told him that she would never want him to do that, and his happiness is important and should be important to him. His character received the "Self Worth" feat which gave his character advantage on contested persuasion on intimidation checks against him. He said later that he really appreciated it, but judges , I ask you: Should I cease and desist this medical malpractice or is DnD basically therapy?

To their excellencies, Dice Christ's hands and gestures, Axford, Murphy and Tanner, and the communion wine stealing choir boy Jake. I would like to confess before the light of Dice Christ, and have my sins wiped clean. I was playing a modified version of Descent into Avernus with an online group of friends. In the first battle against a group of cultists, my level 1 paladin went down. I rolled a natural 1 on my first death save, though managed to survive. I went down again in the next fight, being the only front line fighter in the group. Instead of rolling my death save, I put my dice on the 1, and sent a photo to the DM. I was addicted to the rush of danger and adrenaline of the moment, but frankly I don't feel particularly guilty about it. However, as a mentally ill person who was raised Catholic, this seemed like a good forum.

COLD CASE REOPENED (UPDATE: THE RIDE AND DIE) Today I rise to the call of cases in order to give a long-due update into the investigation of that known as "The Ride and Die." (OG submittion reminder in comments- please shorten both as needed) Well, mighty crew of justices and bailiff J-Jake? Oh wait, I think that's an L? His name is so small next to the judge's names and this fine print is so hard to read... Anyway. Ahem- yes. Justices and Lake: It's been awhile, but! My dad listened to your ruling of his case, was ecstatic, and due to this development he decided it was time to investigate further! So at my dad's suggestion, he, my mom, my younger brother, and I are reopening the case and are in the process of planning a one shot! I've helped them roll characters -dad, on his own, chose oath of redemption paladin (because of course he did). We'll hopefully be able to play next time I'm home. I've given all members their first set of dice, color coded to which hues they associate with their character of course, and I'll be dm'ing for the first time (yikes....). I am hopeful that I can make this an enjoyable experience for them. Any testimonies and further evidence will be presented post-game. I can promise there will be no need to punish me as you did my "uncle" Dave as I will not immediately kill my dad's character. Any proof otherwise will be presented to you, to which I expect to result in my immediate and justified punishment that I will leave up to the court to decide. We are all very excited, but especially my dad! Thank you for your assistance in reopening this case and helping get us closer to my dad receiving justice. Righteously yours, Annie B, Esq. (She/her)

To the honorable Supreme Crit justices and the dreaded lowly baliff that shares my name, I bring to you the case of the centipede that “doesn’t take opportunity attacks”. I was playing a level 2 variant human paladin with the shield master feat, allowing me to bonus action shove enemies when I take the attack action. We were a party at three, with myself and the cleric being relatively tanky protecting our squishy warlock, who was the DM’s boyfriend if that matters. We play with a full battle map/grid and the bonus action shoves had allowed our party to, dare I say, whomp our dm with masterful positioning. The encounter in question was against a centipede like thing that was only one size larger than me, allowing me to shove it off our warlock who quickly scampered away. The stakes were all but gone, but the DM had it go for one last stab at the warlock. When I asked about an opportunity attack, he said this had an ability to negate that. We were able to survive and after the session, I asked my dm if it really had that feature and he told me no, he just wanted to take one last stab and knew it was low hp. Justices, I ask you, was it fair for my DM to ignore the rules in order to keep stakes high or was this a case of a power hungry man who was just unwilling to take the small L. For context, we were later TPK-ed in this same session and I don’t fault him at all for that. My only complaint for this night was the one described above.

To the honorable crit justices the most exhausted wife worm, and hardworking bailiff jorn(?) I present the case of the deck of many things spin   I was the dm of this homebrew curse of strahd x hell mini campaign for my college friends. As the final bbeg battle started, one of my players pulled the fate card, and chose to change the event of them choosing to break in to the dungeon where they got the relic strahd needed, basically time traveling the party back to three sessions earlier. In that moment, I admit I had a bit of a dm sweat moment because I had nothing planned. I made it a impromptu race to the relic. When my party lost a few opposed rolls to see who would get the relic first, the party got upset saying that using the fate card would not have let strahd know their plan of keeping the relic from him. Little did they know I made it nearly impossible to win the race because if the race was won, strahds master plan would have been cut off and any storylines that would have had a nice resolution would have remained unfinished. The campaign ended in a good place but I still wonder if I was wrong for twisting their use of the fate card to progress the story.

Noble Justices and Jeek, I humbly present you with the case of the bard who was too in character. A few years ago in college I made a new friend who wanted to start DMing a campaign for her friends and she invited me to join. Several of the players were new to DND but the DM and I were not. There was one new player in particular, let’s call him Kyle, that everyone else at the table knew, but I had never met. Kyle was a music major and wanted to play a bard. He wanted to be charismatic, powerful, and have a dark past. Unfortunately, when we started playing, he only seemed to be interested in participating when he could romance female npcs, and frequently forgot major details of his backstory. He was somewhat attentive during role play but completely checked out during combat. I sat next to him to offer help with spells and navigating DND beyond when he needed it, so I could see that he spent most of the sessions designing his buff bard (with 10 strength) on hero forge. During one combat session, Kyle actually left the table and sat on the couch playing the guitar when it wasn’t his turn. As you can imagine this was disruptive, and I felt bad for our DM who did a lot of prep for each session. When we asked him to come back to the table, he brought the guitar with him and continued playing. Again, this was distracting. He did after a few months learn better table etiquette, and we had a lot of fun sessions, but to this day he proclaims that I “used to hate him” because he was new to DND. Judges, I ask you, was it wrong of me to be frustrated with Kyle’s behavior, or should I give more grace to a new player?

To the judges that tickle and the bailiff that’s little. I present the case of “DM’s Un-Buttoned Up Spell Saves” I’m the DM in a home-brew, post-apocalyptic New York City campaign. In a recent session, the players were up against a Sorcerer who was the brainwashed sister of an Artificer PC. Long story short, 3 hours into the session, the Sorcerer sister was moments away from achieving her evil brainwashed goal, the key to which was a Polaroid camera she stole from the Bard PC. In a last attempt to stop her, the Bard cast shatter centered on the Sorcerer sister who was holding the camera, to try and break it. The Sorcerer sister rolled a NAT 20 on her con save against the shatter. I ruled that the camera was so important to the Sorcerer, and since she rolled a NAT 20, she sacrificed her body to shield the camera from breaking and took double the damage as a result, instead of the half she would have taken. At our table, if a PC has a creative use of a spell or ability that’s not rules-as-written, we roll to see if they can “over charge their magic” and I considered this a similar use of the NPC’s save. The Bard grumbled a little, but accepted it and gracefully moved on. In the end the party prevailed and the brainwashed sister was saved, but I still feel a little bad about my call. Judges, was it permissible for me to make this ruling even though it technically went against the rules as written or should I have admitted whomping and let the camera break?

To the court I bring: the case of the neighbor DM My girlfriend and I briefly played in a campaign with a couple of neighbors. The DM was one of the neighbors, a cool goth guy. We played a couple of times over the summer holidays, during which it slowly became less fun. For one, the DM was very focused and didn’t like having to explain himself more than once and one of the other players, another neighbor, had never played before and was having some difficulties. The DM did not like spending time explaining to her how the game worked and when we tried to help, he’d continue on without giving her time to understand what was going on. For another, I was playing a cleric and my girlfriend a paladin, and when we asked about what pantheon the world used, he said “I haven’t decided yet.”. I played several sessions without knowing who my god was (I never actually found out). In the end, school got busy and my girlfriend and I weren’t really feeling the campaign. I kept cancelling, but in the end I finally quit, bc canceling several times was more unfair that just ending it, when I knew I wouldn’t have the time or energy. The DM never answered when I wrote him to quit. Now, whenever I see him, I awkwardly hide until he is out of view and it is getting pretty difficult. Justices, have I done wrong here, could I have done something different? I throw myself at your mercy.

To these absolute knobs, May it challenge the court and upset the power they wield. I bring you the case of "WTF High Crit, you got a problem with me?" I have written in in the past for your assistance and all you do is punish me. My players fill up a bag with bombs - my fault. My player brings and OP, roided out, charisma laden God bird to the scrub match - my fault. My players name them selves all Tyler - not only my fault - but justice Murphy says he must make an example of me and creates the first NADDPOD precedent in my name. Furthermore, Justice/ Lowly lowly lowly bailiff Axeford openly stated on record she wished to torment me. I have clearly been targeted and I demand retribution from this kangaroo court. I ask YOU NADDPOLES if this tyranny should continue. Good day. P.S. I don't even like this show. P.S.S. I will settle for Emily's 1st ugly mug, that unfortunately sounds extremely delightful

Dear for the most part honorable judges, and the somewhat honorable baliff, I present would like to present you with the “The Case of the Unused Subclass” I was running my second campaign ever, the “Dragon Heist” module, with my first campaign being the “Out of the Abyss” module that deals with Demons, and the Underdark. My player came up to me, and said that he wanted to play a Drow Druid that was somewhat corrupted by demonic powers during the events of the first campaign. I thought that sounded great, and was even game when he asked if I could make a homebrew subclass that would help him be a melee combat as opposed to ranged spell casting. I was excited, and got to work, I will include the subclass at the bottom of this message. We worked together, and both were happy with what we came up with. Judges, I kid you not, through the entire 30 sessions we played, this player did not use a single subclass feature. Not one. Not even the extra attack feature I gifted him at level 6. The game itself was actually fine, and it ended very successfully, but sometimes I think about the fact that I spent significant time making a subclass to fit my players wishes, and he ended up doing nothing with it. I will admit, I never followed up with my player to make sure things were ok, but he also never came to me to ask for changes. So Judges, did I give a bad subclass, or did I just have an ingrate for a player? ———————— Circle of Viciousness- Tathnar Druid Subclass 2nd level feature; Vicious Curse - When you choose this subclass at 2nd level you gain proficiency with martial weapons In addition, your strikes have the power to further weaken your opponents. When you hit with a melee weapon attack, you can expend a use of your wildshape to cause one of the following effects: 1)The target makes a Charisma saving throw. On a failure, The target has disadvantage on all saving throws. At the end of each of its turns, the creature rolls a Charisma saving throw. On a success this effect ends 2)The target makes a Constitution saving throw. On a failure, the target gains vulnerablility to a damage type of your choice. If the creature is resistant to the chosen damage type, it loses that resistance. This trait does not function if the target is immune to the chosen damage type. This effect ends when the target takes any amount of the chosen damage type. 3)The target makes a Constitution Saving throw.On a failure, at the start of each of its turns, the target takes 1d6 necrotic damage, as your curse ravages its body. This lasts for 1 minute, or untill the creature recives magical healing. While this curse is active, you gain an amount of hit points equal to necrotic damage dealt by this curse. 6th level feature; Extra attack. You can attack twice instead of once when you take the attack action. 10th level feature; Bulwark against Brutality. You gain resistance to Fire, Cold, and Lightning damages. 14th level feature; Living Weapon. As an action, you can expend both of your Wildshapes to become a Living Weapon for 1 minute. While in this state, you gain a +5 to attack and damage rolls using a melee weapon, and you can cast cantrips as a bonus action. Additionally, you score a critical hit with a melee weapon on a roll of 18-20. Additionally, when you score a critical hit with a melee weapon, you regain one use of your Wildshape.

To the extremely honorable and cool judges and baliff jark, I present the case of dwarven loyalty. Me and my longtime group were playing a new campaign, with still level-1 characters. I was playing Hilda Battletank, dwarven barbarian, and we had just re-entered the tavern after fulfilling our level 1 quest, drained of all resources before we could long rest and level up. After we got our quest reward from an npc but before we could rest, some clearly high-level bad guys came in the inn and proclaimed they wanted to arrest the npc, who told us to run. Now everyone at the table was an experienced dm, so we all knew this was a "running away" encounter, and I could tell that if I fought, I would die. The problem, dear judges, was Bill. Bill was a dwarvish npc who we met on the way out to the quest, who turned up here upon our return. When the bad guys started attacking, there was no world Hilda would have run while he was still fighting. Me and the DM had even discussed character futures, and he had written a list of tasks for my character to achieve their destiny, including acts of heroism in front of other dwarves and surmounting impossible odds. So of course, I stayed and fought, and of course my character died, as did Bill. So my question is this, if I *knew* I would die by fighting, but the dm *knew* the character would never not fight in that scenario, who's to blame? Should I have just run and let Bill die, to the disgrace of all my dwarvenness?

To the Honourable Justices — and that other guy — I bring you the case of the sexist player and the awkward DM. I usually play D&D online, but I found a local board game cafe running one-shots and decided to give it a try. The table was me (female), three male players, and a male DM. The first hour went fine, and during our break before combat, we started chatting about other games. I mentioned I was in a Strahd campaign (go Triplets!) and another where the DM (female, thats important) had adapted Game of Thrones. She had assigned us each a Stark family member so we could play through the story (hopefully changing some plot points). One of the guys at the table then said — word for word — “Of course a woman would choose to run a story that’s already written. Something original would be too much hard work.” (Worth noting: this same guy had just said he was running Icespire Peak and was glad he didn’t have to make things up himself). I told him the she would be creating original content as we would be diverging from the original plot. He seemed annoyed I didn’t laugh at his sexist joke and doubled down by saying it sounded boring and pointless because we’d just do what the original characters did. Nobody else said anything. The table DM awkwardly said we should jump back into combat. I told him I wasn’t comfortable, but the DM just urged me to keep playing and to forget about it. Instead, I left and ended up emailing the café the next morning. So, Justices — should I have expected the DM or other players to step in, or was it not on them to help?

I’m submitting this on behalf of Jessie A (who introduced me to NADDPOD)! To the wise justices and honorable bailiff, My beloved husband and DM likes to make background music playlists for our campaign. His tavern playlist includes multiple Tchaikovsky pieces from Nutcracker and “Libiamo” from La Traviata. He insists this is not weird. Other players have called the choices “interesting” and I have told him it is bizarre to play DND to La Traviata. He says “Libiamo” is a literal drinking song so it’s perfect. I say it’s in Italian and it’s still weird. And I’m sorry, but the Nutcracker overture is not “high elf vibes”! Obviously he can do what he wants but am I wrong?

Oh beloved Cardinals of the Crit, I lay before you, perhaps not a sin most foul, but a sin nonetheless Allow me to paint you a picture. My players were in an underground dungeon filled with demons, and fairly low on resources. While in this state, they came upon 2 demons eating the body of a third. The group decided to sneak past the demons to avoid a fight. I had them all roll stealth checks one by one, and lo and behold, they all succeeded. However, as the characters were celebrating their victory, the Dark Elf rogue then said, “I turn back and go to fight the demons” All of the other characters were incensed, and tried to stop him. It soon became clear though, that for some inexplicable reason, this Dark Elf Rogue would not be deterred. It was then that the Tabaxi Wizard cast “Sleep” on the Dark Elf. My Cardinals of the Crit, it is importantly to know here, that Elves are immune to magical sleep. Here lies my sin. I forgot this fact The Wizard rolled high enough to put the Rogue to sleep. Instead of carrying his unconscious body, the group decided to leave the body there, and sneak away. Because Sleep lasts for 1 minute, and because the demons were so close to the body, I had the demons roll perception checks every round to see if they noticed the rogues body. Which they did. The demons then jumped at the body, and proceeded to kill this rogue. I did not realize my mistake until 1 session later, and still feel bad about it. So, Cardinals? Am I still worthy of Dice Christs love? Ps. This rogue was 3rd character of this player, and eventually ended the campaign with a total of 6 characters, all of which died, the 6th one being introduced 2 sessions before the final battle of the campaign

To the magnificent judges and... bailiff? If he's here? I bring to you the case of "my players keep razzing me about level ups." If i am ever so slightly late to our online sessions (which includes basically me not being first into the call) my players yell that theyre level 69 in every class and subclass. They also ask me for level ups almost every session (they leveled up and fought one (1) monster of a slightly higher CR than them and they were like "we get a level up right we go from level 4 to level 5 right are we level 7 now omg we're totally level 10 we gotta be"). Do I have any recourse?

dearest clergy of dice christ. i write, not with a confession of wrongdoing, but with a plea. i am a numbers bitch. i love data and a good graph is a sight to behold. so i created a spreadsheet to track and graph my dice rolls. i only count rolls made in a session, called for by the dm (ie sitting and rolling a d20 50 times in a row doesn’t count), and when rolling with advantage or disadvantage, both numbers rolled are counted. while i continue to have faith in dice christ and her benevolent omniscience, i fear she has forsaken me. in 2025, i rolled 353 d20s across my campaigns and one shots, and only 7 of those were nat 20s. yes, that is less than 2% of my rolls (1.98% to be exact). what must i do in 2026 to regain dice christ’s favor so that i may crit once more? thank you for your holy wisdom.

To the Judges of Ill Repute and the Bailiff. I bring the case of Myself versus D&D Court. I have been listening to the backlog of D&D court while I work on my masters thesis, and during my waking hours all is well. I share in the guffaws and have a good time, but my dreams are invaded by the cruel punishments of the justices. Every night I dream that the judges are delivering unto me a cruel and unusual punishment for not having my thesis done in time. I seek no judgement in this case, but I will have my reparations. One day when you least expect it, and when it is most disadvantageous I will strike your dice with a natural 2.

Dear esteemed justices Murphy, Axford, and Shenobi. In my early days of DMing I was really worried about making fights unbalanced (either too hard or too easy) so I would not give my monsters hit points. Instead I would determine behind the screen, without my players knowledge, when it felt "right" for a monster to die. It went well for my games so I posted about it on reddit, and was promptly dressed down and lambasted by the community for fudging rolls and railroading my players. One commenter wrote an essay in which they said my players were lions and I was refusing to let them hunt. Over time I've learned to let go of control over combat to such an extent but I still remain quietly adamant that for a newbie DM this was perfectly acceptable. I leave it in the hands of the court. Was I wrong to deprive my lions of their hunt, or was I right to protect myself from getting bit.

To the judges of inestimable wisdom, and the powerful bailiff of ill repute, may it please the court to hear the case of "Rampant Old Man Adoption". I ran a Curse of Strahd game a few years back, and in my version there was an old man who was sabotaging efforts by the town of Vallaki because he believed Strahd would win and capitulating was the only safe choice. Once the party found this out they ended up beating him up, and handing him off to the Wereravens to keep an eye on. This happened in some fashion or the other 4 more times, because rather than kill them the players felt bad and wanted to keep adopting all the weird old dudes that tried to fight them. Eventually I had to have the Wereravens tell them that they couldn't hold anymore old men in their basement in order to stop my players from backtracking to drop off every weird old man they fought. It all worked out ok but my players were sad that they could no longer "adopt" old men that were trying to kill them. Was I right to put a stop to it, or should I have let them have their harem anime moment?