February 2024 Sly Flourish Patreon Q&A
Welcome to the Sly Flourish Patreon Questions and Answers thread for February 2024!
Ask your monthly RPG-related question in the comments below!
Every Friday morning I answer every question on this post. Some questions make it to the Lazy RPG Talk Show, an RPG Tip video, or Sly Flourish article. Don't be upset if your question doesn't make it to the show – only a handful do.
As you consider your question for the month, please
search the Lazy RPG Talk Show Topic Database using keywords from your question to see if I've answered your question previously. You can also search Sly Flourish and the Sly Flourish YouTube Channel to see if I've done an article or video on the topic.
focus your question on tabletop RPGs.
ask only one question each month.
keep your question brief. I love your stories but I get overwhelmed.
Thank you so much for helping me do what I do.
Now bring on the questions!!
Comments (123)
Regarding Magic Items... It seems that magic items may need to be a little more magical. If you have a +3 Longsword, does it have a name? Who made it? Where? Does it have any powers... or ones that you dont know about? Another thing I try to do is not always have a flat +/- bonuse or penalty. I think some weapons may have a different bonus to hit and then one for damage. +1/+2 etc. or just a flat +2 to both. You see, someone put a lot of time, effort, and magic into this item. This doesn't regard all items. You can give potions dirfferent names, but I'm really talking about items that are more permanent. Sorry to ramble on, but I do you think magic items should be handled with a little more uniqueness. A lot of lesser items may be available due to some sort of quirk with the item because it was someones early attempt aat making a magically imbued item. Some items may be superior without any magic, but due to quality and balancing. These would be a perfect candidate for a bonus to hit but not as much damage: +1/-2. Anyway, I've rambled on long enough, please post any comments you may have.
Good morning! Was just listening to your prep episode where you discussed what notes the GM needs to take. For me the biggest thing that I struggle to remember is where I dropped the secrets and clues (which ones have the players uncovered, and who told them what). It's a bit too complicated to easily note in the moment while improvising (or at least, the way I'm trying to do it isn't working very well). How do you keep track of this?
I'll turn your question around a little bit – is it important to remember that sort of thing? Does it come back up often or do the players remember? One way to do it is to ask the *players* to write down such notes in a way that you can refer to them. Personally, it's rare that I need to go back and keep track of which secret was revealed in which way. Sometimes I reveal something the players already knew but that's ok. It reinforces what they learned. So my big question is – is it worth keeping track of in the first place? And, if it is, maybe ask the players to keep track of it in a way you can reference yourself.
What do you think will be the best TTRPG of 2024 and why is it Everyone Is Seagulls
This is the only real question
I'm planning an epic ending to my Waterdeep: Dragon Heist sandbox. Multiple competing Big Bads will be competing with the heroes for the Vault of Dragons and the level 6 party will only survive if they play them off against each other. Problem is: I'm worried of stripping agency from my players by creating an NPC-led ending.
It's a good thing to be concerned about. Ultimately, you want the choices of the players to guide which factions end up at the top. You can play it out the same way Princes of the Apocalypse works in whichever factions the characters haven't torn down rises the other factions until there's only one left at the end for the characters to face. It's a little bit like whack a mole but the conclusion still works. When considering these factions, think about how they'd react or act as the characters make choices. Which ones become desperate and make mistakes? Which ones bide their time? Which ones lose the power they had and which ones gain power? It can be a lot of fun but complicated to run. Good luck!
I have a data management problem! Specifically, I have over a TB of content that I've downloaded over the years from Patreon from the artists and creatives I support. I will almost certainly not live long enough to use all this material or even read it (and I will continue to subscribe to them in order to support their work)-- but I know for SURE there are great assets in there, if only I could find them when I need them! And that doesn't even cover the problem of continuing to download Patreon content as it's published-- it's a very manual process that's different for each creator and, well, it sucks. So perhaps that's two questions: 1) How can I better organize and browse my Patreon content and 2) how can I make sure that I don't overlook any Patreon content and download everything into my library in a way that is not frustratingly manual and error prone?
Yeah, this is a tough problem and some patreons are better at it than others. I try to make sure every reward you get on Sly Flourish is one click away on a single rewards page. Some are offering weekly or monthly dribs and drabs. For me, I just ignore it, frankly. I belong to too many patrons to pay that much attention to them. I'm there to support their work. So one answer is "let it go". Another approach is to set up one directory for each patreon you belong to and subfolders if needed for different product types you put in there and just save away. Something similar to: https://slyflourish.com/organizing_digital_rpg_materials.html
We are going a new direction in our campaign that everyone seems to think will be more fun. A couple of players are retiring their characters and making new PCs they are more interested in. I want to introduce a rival team into the mix since my PCs are so competitive. How do I keep the party from killing off the rivals so that they can have a long term impact on the game?
Keep the rivals out of the reach of their swords and spells. Have the rivals known by reputation, out there doing stuff. Have them show up in situations where combat can't be the way out. Maybe ensure the rivals aren't simply *hated* but maybe someone the characters dig so they *don't* want to kill them. Introducing and reintroducing the rivals off-camera is a great way for the players to know of them and see what they're doing without putting them in harms way.
Hi there, in your home games how much cross talk is there. Do you guys spend an hour talking about your week. I struggle because everyone else is talking about work and I just want to play the game and I feel like I am annoying by always telling people it's their turn. Do you make a rule to keep talk on the game or do I just need to get over it and just have fun even if everyone doesn't take it as serious as me. Thank you keep up the great work
We don't have a formal rule but my groups are pretty well behaved. Sometimes it can be useful to take a break and let people talk a bit – before the game can work. I like to have a key phrase that starts the game – "who wants to describe what happened in last week's game?" If it's a real problem, a small correction might work like "Hang on, guys, let soandso take their turn". If it's a bigger problem, an out of game conversation about it can help a lot. This can be much worse if one is playing online. Crosstalk online is *really* disruptive. So yeah, small non-confrontational conversations at the table is one way and then, if needed, an out of game conversation about it recognizing that sometimes people just want to socialize a bit.
Recently, I’ve started an Eberron campaign. As part of my online research, I discovered Keith Baker’s “Exploring Eberron” on DM’s Guild. I bought it immediately, and I’m glad I did. But I’m having a hard time making sense of DM’s Guild’s policies on which campaign settings can be used by third party publishers for DMG products. It seems that some settings—like Eberron and Ravenloft—are fair game, and others—such as Greyhawk and Dragonlance—are not. Why is this? And might it change with the 2024 D&D update? I don’t understand how the restrictive policy helps WotC/Hasbro. Why not allow third party DMG publishers to use all the traditional campaign settings? For example, a more open policy could breath life into Greyhawk beyond just Saltmarsh.
I can't answer a lot of these questions but I'll throw some stuff out there. Yeah, some worlds are open for writing on the Guild. Others are not. Who can say why exactly or whether more will open up in the future. It's their playground so they get to make the rules and don't have to explain themselves to anyone. Honestly, I'd avoid writing for the guild and focus on making your own material not tied to WOTC's IP that sits alongside it.
I have been interested in Humblewood recently. However being unique setting with animal folk , a lot of my random generators don't work with it. I noticed this happens with non typical settings with other tools. A lot supplements really expect classic fantasy setting.I was wondering if there a way to alleviate this problem.
I think the best way is to come up with your own! If you find yourself needing a list more than once, write up your own list. I'm a big fan of doing this with "factions" which might include the various animal folk ancestries. When using existing random tables, you might have to twist the results a bit to fit a stranger setting but lots of times adding a faction on top of a more traditional result can give you the ideas you need. More in that here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M-cMZgOAFcY&t=2418s
Late in the month, so will ask next month if the ship has sailed... but how do you feel the steps of the Lazy DM do, or can, apply to a Play-by-Post game? I run a IDRotF campaign over text on Discord and with no set session start/end it's hard to apply the steps. Should I arbitrarily mark time as a session? Like treat an entire month as one session? Or maybe let the "session" run until a certain trigger, like a set piece or when i have 3 or less secrets/clues left? How would you apply them?
I have no experience with play-by-post games so I really don't have much to offer. I did see that D&D Beyond recently had an article about PbP: https://www.dndbeyond.com/posts/1668-play-by-post-playing-dungeons-dragons-in-pbp I think it's fair to basically look at your prep notes and see if they need a refresh. You might want to choose a period of time, say a week or a month or however often you feel it works, and treat that as your time to write up a new set of notes. Maybe it's once per "adventure" or more often if you feel like you ran out of stuff.
Hey Mike :) A couple weeks ago on the Lazy D&D Talk show, you shouted out that video by Baron de Ropp and Kelsey Dionne (you also mentioned that you hadn't finished watching it, I hope you made it through - such a great conversation). Near the end of their talk, they mention two different styles of world building - Baron took more of the "outside-in" approach (setting up the bulk of the campaign, geopolitics) vs. Kelsey's "inside-out" approach (prepping for the next session, more go with the flow while still having a good idea of the world around the players). Where do you fall in this spectrum? I'm starting to build a campaign setting after a couple of years DMing published modules and although I haven't found it hard to start, I'm not sure how much I want to be writing ahead/building and fleshing out the world without input from my players/PCs.
I'm definitely on the side of inside out – spiral campaign development. You can find more about it here: https://slyflourish.com/spiral_campaign_building.html I do think its useful to have a larger overarching campaign idea but instead of homebrewing it, I set it in a big published setting someone else has spent years putting together instead of my own.
Hey Mike! A bit late with my timing, so feel free to move this to next week. I'm working on a campaign in Theros based on the Kingmaker campaign in Pathfinder. I'll have a hexmap of the world and I want to include 1) some kind of a stronghold system in one of the cities which they can upgrade over time 2) some kind of warfare system which allows them and their armies to control what they have, occupy and explore new hexes, and launch assaults on other faction's fortresses. It seems a bit daunting, especially numbers-wise, so I was wondering if you have any Lazy DM resources/ideas for this. I like your ideas of having them do scenes during a siege and the army is just in the background. But I know my players would want some more tactical involvement, or at least have a say in strategic decisions for the army. Also, they won't always be with their armies, so I need a system for that as well.
You got me just as I was finishing up for the day! It could be worth spending some time with the players to talk about what sort of system you can all enjoy. Do a sort of mid-campaign session zero where you talk about particular opportunities and systems you might use for something like that. There are plenty of books that cover this sort of thing including Trials and Treasure by A5e, Kingdoms and Warfare by MCDM, and others. I much prefer a more simplified narrative system where the actions they take result in upgrades or growth without any specific faction mechanics or rules. It just happens as they do stuff. They can recruit new NPCs, build up mercenary forces, build new stuff, spend gold and all of that happens in the narrative instead of with some crunchy system. But if you think your players prefer a crunchy system, it might be worth taking a look at a few and talking them through with your players. Don't recommend one you don't like yourself though. You'll have to live with the choice they make!
What is the maximum amount of time you can spend on each level without it getting stale? I want to run my campaign mainly between levels 5-8 but plan for it to go longer than the typical X Sessions for Level X, Y Sessions for Level Y, etc. Would giving other rewards like magic items or even feats help the shelf life of a single level?
That really depends on the game. I don't think there's a specific answer. If the story is evolving and players feel like their characters are following along a journey, you can probably go a long time without leveling. If things are fast and furious, I imagine players want to see their characters grow. I think leveling every two to four sessions is probably good but it can definitely go longer.
What tools do you use for your in person games? I'm starting a new campaign soon and one of my players has shown interest in being the designated notetaker. I've been considering trying to share a notion notebook (maybe the campaign one?) so that I can also have access to them and keep track of what they're picking up on and stuff. Additionally, since he will already have his laptop out anyways, I figured I could use it to share NPC art and maybe even maps. Have you tried doing something like this before? How do you typically share art for in person games? (sorry, i realize this might be closer to 2 questions :P)
I have players who share their type-written notes in a Discord "Adventure Notes" channel. They can type them up wherever they wish but having a way to share those notes are great. If players wanted to write them by hand, they can always share pictures of their notes too. I'm switching back to hand-written notes and a big blue trapper keeper style binder for my in-person games myself so my notes are a glorious mess.
Hi Mike, I told my players to approach me with wishes regarding what magic items they would appreciate for their characters, to make my job easier. One player now asked for a "cool weapon", which I'm happy to provide and custom design. Another player, who is intersted in the design side of things, approached me whether the two of us wanted to design that weapon for her, "he has ideas". I am reluctant to let him in on the process: A) I feel it is my prerogative as a DM to give out rewards and make my players happy--that's part of the joy of DMing, B) I feel like it is taking away some behind the scenes control away from me (though I'm much in favor of player agency when we PLAY), C) I feel this introduces asymmetries between the players that should be reserved for the DM-player relationship. Am I wrong or too selfish? Thanks in advance!
I think its fair to say that you want to keep the design of such items on the GM side of things. There's definitely a conflict of interests having a player design a weapon for a companion instead of the GM doing it. I think its ok to let them know you want to design the weapon itself. It also leads a little bit into one player telling another player how to play which can be trouble. Will the other player tell the first player that they helped design the other player's weapon? That doesn't feel right either. I think its safe to say "I've got this".
You run three games a week, launch massively successful kickstarters, write an article a week (at least), have a weekly talk show and podcast, write adventures and how-to books, create digital tools for your patrons, research and keep up with ttrpg news, engage with patrons via Q&A and discord, create youtube videos, write a newsletter, AND have a FT day job. I don’t know of a more productive person. I’m constantly amazed by what you release. How do you do it?
You're very kind and I'm glad you dig the stuff I do! I wrote more about this topic here: https://www.notion.so/slyflourish/How-to-Make-It-in-the-RPG-Industry-3b2b2fd121204578b57bf1dd3deafeb5#08a329c542ed4439b4aba8b8281a7052 See the section on "managing my time".
I'm using an old school module as a story base to run a 5e campaign. One of the players has just picked up a magic item which while useful, is cursed. He doesn't know it yet. If he attunes to it, or uses identify, he will learn all its properties under the 5e ruleset we are using. He will learn that apart from it's useful ability, it will slowly turn him evil and lure him towards the BBEG and his cult of monstrous followers. While this is good, the original text explicitly explains that the previous user (high level cleric) went mad and killed all his followers with everyone turning to wraiths. That player tends to dominate the direction play by force of personality from time to time, but he is usually very fair minded. I'm reluctant to have the whole curse thing in case he runs wild with it to the detriment of the game. Should I just change the properties of the item? Any advice?
I would avoid taking agency away from the player and players and instead treat the cursed item as an NPC the character can hear who offers deals and influences the character through engaging narrative instead of a failed saving throw or something like that. I'm a HUGE fan of sentient evil intelligent magic items the players *know* is evil but still offers great deals they can't resist. You're corrupting the character through their player instead of doing it with pure secrets and mechanics. This is a fantastic topic worthy of an article or video!
When you notice that you've fallen into a rut, and every adventure begins to feel the same, or worse, every campaign does, how do you get yourself out of the rut and making amazing adventures once again? I.e. How do you change the flavor and general themes of your games when you find things getting repetitive?
That's a tough question. Sometimes, I imagine, the rut isn't really the ideas but just an overall feeling about the game or other things going on in one's life. Being too busy, being run down, other potential issues. I always try to "focus on the fun" and think about the parts of the adventure I'm really looking forward to and getting there. Or if I'm in a particular situation or theme in an adventure to think what part of it I like the best. Can I add something cool? What can I draw in that excites the players and excites me? Bringing things back around to the characters, who they are and their desires, can help too. And the idea of writing down a list of ten potential ideas that get you excited about the game again and seeing which one you want to run through. I think its also fair to have a big event in the game that changes the style of game you have going on. Stephen King famously blew up the story in his book, quite literally, when he ran out of steam while writing the Stand.
Hi Mike, thanks for all your help through the years! My group of six players and I will be celebrating the 5th anniversary of our slow (they're at lvl 7) homebrew campaign. I started using published adventures to get ideas and locations to help me with pacing. For this anniversary we'll be playing all day with several breaks. I thought of inviting other 2 players who were part of the group at some point to join us in this special session, but I am worried about having a session with 7-8 players because everything will be slow. Apart from the tips for speeding combat, do you have any tips on how to manage a session with so many people and in such a long session? At the moment the group is exploring Omu from Tomb of annihilation so the returning players will use new characters that could have short-term goals so maybe they could help for only some part of the session?
Honestly, there's no easy way. Seven to eight players is two beyond my personal limit. If it's a longer game, you'll still have time to give each character some screen time. I would probably make it clear as the game begins that because you have so many players, you'll need them to be moving quickly. 7th level and above can be hard because they have lots of actions, bonus actions, and reactions – all of which slow down the game. I wish I had better news but it's just plain hard. Here's more: https://youtu.be/QhpiJezR7VE?t=1971s
Hi Mike, I do use a scenes from previous episode at the start of my session. We play every other week and I always provide the summary and emphasize what I view as important. But I do miss out on what the players valued. I do think by providing it, it speeds up the delivery. In your opinion, is it better for me to provide it or is it better to ask the characters what they remember?
I recommend asking them to summarize the previous session and you can put in your own parts if they clearly missed something important. It's a great way to test your campaign and see what they're into. It also rewards those players who took notes on the session – hang onto them, they're the best.
I am starting a new campaign featuring one experienced player and three new players to DnD. As they developed interest secondary to Balder's Gate, I decided to run Storm King's Thunder since it features so many places in the Forgotten Realms. The adventure seems a bit disjointed. Also, this will most likely be the only time I run this adventure. Seems a shame not to use all of the encounters in Chapter 2 so I would like to string them together. I think I have a way to do that. (but any suggestions would be welcome) Chapter 3 on the other hand seems like a mess, and I am having trouble getting my head around it. Any suggestions for chapter 3?
Storm King's Thunder is really more of a setting than an adventure. There are lots of things to use but I wouldn't hang onto it too tightly. It's a very loose and huge adventure covering thousands of miles. Find the parts you like and add your own where you wish to build a larger campaign. I wrote a lot about Storm Kings Thunder. This article is a good place to start and includes links to the others: https://slyflourish.com/getting_the_most_out_of_skt.html
Aloha Mike, I understand that having a campaign above 10th level makes creating good, challenging, and meaningful encounters more tricky while also trying to avoid artificially scaling everything up in difficulty (i.e. the guards in this city are all of a sudden much more difficult and tough than in the last one). However, when I'm creating encounters I wish I had some kind of checklist or guidelines to follow so that I don't find out that the players can easily circumvent things during the game. Any good advice on this? My players are currently level 13.
Its probably best to make your own checklist based on your own experiences with the characters and players at your table. One of the difficulties of running high level 5e is that not only are the characters more powerful, but they're more powerful in specific game-altering ways that no single formula or checklist can anticipate. That said, of course, the lazy encounter benchmark is intended to give you that challenge rating line where battles may be too difficult (and anything significantly below is too easy). There are lots of ways to altar the benchmark such as pretending you have a fewer or greater number of characters than you actually have and using the optional rules to increase the benchmark at 11th and 17th level. Forge of Foes has several different ways to look at encounters and gauge whether they'll be a challenge for characters at different levels. But your own experiences always trump whatever overall guidelines you decide to use.
I'm fairly new to DM'ing, having only run prewritten official 5e modules, with the second one due to finish in a couple of session. During both of these modules (Witchlight and Strixhaven) I felt that I was at my most comfortable when I was forced to come up with my own ideas and characters as it gave me the freedom to add my own flair to things. As a result, I've decided my next campaign will likely be set in a homebrew setting. This will give me the opportunity to truly make the world my own and hopefully allow me to bring A-Game when DM'ing as I'll have a better understanding of the world itself when the randomness of the players choices require me improvise. Over the last few weeks I've been looking to start worldbuilding but I've been hesitant to start because quite frankly, I don't know WHERE to start. Do you have any recommendations on where I should start worldbuilding and some key aspects I need to have prepared. Alternatively, if there is no one right answer, how do you reccomend I figure out what works best for me? (apologies if this is too long)
Two things that you'll need to know 1) there are two schools of worldbuilding top down, where you design the outer part and infrastructure of the world before going into details, and bottom up, when you start with the details your need right now for this adventure in this world, and continue build up as needed for further adventures. 2) You'll need to figure for yourself when is the point that enough is enough, don't design things the players most probably will not get into.
Hey Mike, recently I started working on a 5e-Adventure to be published as a free PDF. My goal is to basically create my version of that basic fantasy TTRPG experience (similar to Lost mine of Phandelver and Shadowed Keep on the Borderlands). I did some research regarding the structure and layout of TTRPG adventures. I find myself more and more drawn towards that „bullet point style“ like you see in some OSE publications and Shadowdark RPG. I find the usual style of 5e to be not easy enough to reference during play. Which brings me to my question. Do you think it would be best to stick to the typical layout style of a 5e product (like seen in the official WOTC publications) or do you think my adventure can still be well received if formatted in more of a „bullet point style“?
When I write adventures, I try to read as many different styles as I can and pick the styles I like the best. More abbreviated styles with fewer words I think can work really well. I thought the design of Dragon of Icespire Peaks and Stormwreck Isle were excellent as was Light of Xaryxis. I also love the style of the Arcane Library for its 5e adventures. There are many different ways to write adventures and no single way is clearly the best one. Find the style you like, write for it, have people try it out, get their feedback, and iterate. I would recommend writing a series of short adventures instead of a big long one before you find the style you prefer. Good luck!
I'm a new DM running Phandelver for my family. 2 players (husband and son). Son follows husband, does what he wants and husband is so cautious. Example: last session he left exploration of hideout under Tresendar Manor because the air got cold and he felt the Gnothic (never saw or heard it) prying at his mind, even though he succeeded in keeping it out. He plays so circumspectly and tries to get the townsfolk to help on adventures all the time. He has said he thought the DM was the bad guy and thought I wanted to kill them, but I think he believes me now when I say that is not what my job is as DM. How do I help a reluctant, inexperienced player explore, when my only other player is inexperienced too? I have adjusted scenarios for the two of them, so they don't TPK. Should I just let an NPC agree to help them as a sidekick and see if the extra muscle will change the timid play or am I missing something? Thanks in advance.
A sidekick can't hurt -- one controlled by one of the players, probably your husband, but that's not always necessary. You can use inspiration as a way to incentivize them to take more risk and make it clear when it's in their interests to go further into a chamber or room by drawing them in with advantageous positions or shiny jewels or other things. I think you're right to speak to them out of character and explain that you're not out to kill them. Sometimes, though, players are just naturally cautious. It still might not change their timid play. You can also have the NPCs clarify to them that *they* are the heroes everyone's counting on!
Hi Mike, I find for me one of the minor speed bumps that prevent me from improvising a monster is if I’m adapting a published module. If it says “4 skeletons”, I have to look up the skeleton stat block to see what the CR is to figure out what I’d replace it with or what the FoF baseline is that I’d swap in for an easier time stat line to run with just some flavour or a single monster power. I think for me the missing piece would be if an adventure said “4 skeletons (CR 1/4)”. Thoughts? Maybe when I first read an adventure I should just mark up all the CRs.
I've thought about doing something like this in the City of Arches but I'm not sure if I'll go through with it or not. One trick is that you can use the Monster Stats by CR table in Forge of Foes to see what sorts of monsters line up to which CRs and then use that to gauge the CR of a given monster in an adventure. Don't be afraid to wing it based on your own perception of the monster and its place in the adventure. You're going to be the one describing it and running it!
Hi Mike, I have heard you speak about one on one (also known as duet) play before and how it is a great way to experience 5e. My question is are you at all familiar with the DnD Duet Blog and the Kickstarter they are running for a full duet campaign? I have run the original version of this and it was great but it seems the Kickstarter aims to re edit and add a bunch of new content. I would love to see you spotlight the Kickstarter and give this style of play a well deserved boost.
Hi Dr. AngryEyes! I love the work Beth and Jonathan have done on dndduet! They've inspired a lot of my thoughts about one-on-one games. I am apprehensive about this Kickstarter, though. $45 for a PDF of this sort is just too pricy for me to recommend. I'm very aware of the struggles for independent publishers to get their work out there at a price that can help support their work and with smaller runs, the cost has to be spread out but people are spending real money on these things and there are a lot of ways to spend $45. I get it, it's tough and I love their work but that's just too high for me to recommend.
Hi Mike When running written adventure, do you read the entire book, then refer back to and skim sections as you get to them or do you only read as far as the next session or two? I will be running Ghost of Saltmarsh soon, and our sessions will probably be 3-4 weeks apart. I want to read the book, but also ensure that I don't forget what's going on when I have to run the specific adventure, what do you recommend?
This article is a little old but it covers how I recommend digging into published adventures: https://slyflourish.com/reading_published_adventures.html The more you read, the more useful it will be but that doesn't mean you have to read it cover to cover. Hope that helps!
Hi Mike, new patreoner and first time poster here, so firstly thanks so much for all you do for our community! I’m planning a 1-20 homebrew campaign based loosely on Theros, and already got overexcited with a huge range of ideas for it including the end of campaign god-eating lovecraftian moon. My question is do you have any tips for planning a dauntingly large-scale campaign? Specifically, what should I be taking to session 0 so that I can keep the world flexible to what the players are interested in, while also giving them a foundation of the kinds of things that will fit the adventure in the first place. I’m determined not to over prep despite my excitement, and intend to use the lazy DM steps to evolve the story as we go. Thanks I’m advance and apologies if this is a poorly defined question!
Thank you so much for joining! My recommendation is to always focus on the next session you plan to run and keep your larger campaign planning very loose. I cover this in chapter 16 of Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master. Focus on the large bits and the potential villains but focus your detailed prep on the next session and where it goes. Don't get too caught up in things that aren't part of the next session or two of the game you're going to run. For your session zero, these articles may help: https://slyflourish.com/running_session_zeros.html https://slyflourish.com/one_page_campaign_guide.html Good luck!
Hey Mike. Sort of random, but any house rules for letting non magic users use magic items/relics? If one of my non spell casting PCs picks up a relic, I’d like them to have a solid chance of it actually working (at least the same chance a magic user would have) and the existing rules for say, scrolls, don’t really cut it. Thanks.
I've never limited single-use relics to only spellcasters. In my games, anyone can use a relic with a single-use or even daily-use ability on it. They have to attune to it if it's a daily-use item. Baldur's Gate 3 shows us how varied the game can be when we give classes access to spells otherwise locked behind other classes. It's great fun.
I'm running a homebrew campaign for about 14 sessions now. We are about to finish chapter of the story and I have felt like the story is not going the way I pitched it to be during session zero. The players really like the world and their character’s but are not completely invested in the story. What are your thoughts and tips on maybe doing a long downtime like year or more then a new session zero 2.0 to pitch a new story?
I think a mid-campaign session zero can work very well but you might build the new story arc based on what the players have indicated they dig. You can start by asking them what parts of the larger story they're interested in and which ones they're not so you can steer it that way. Then refocus back to a new elevator pitch and get the story moving in a single direction again. That's my thought!
I'm running a published adventure (Tyranny of Dragons) because I don't have time to prep custom content every week, but it's obvious that some of my players have read or watched spoilers. I don't want to penalize them for it, but I think it spoils their fun. I worry that it may lead to them losing interest in the campaign. We've already switched from the Essentials Kit to Tyranny, so I don't feel like I can change the whole story again. I am changing up encounters somewhat, but is there anything else I can do?
The tyranny of Giants
You may have already answered this, but I cant find anything. How do I onboard people to playing TTRPG's who have never played? What things do I cover as the basics to get them playing? I had this situation come up and I explained about the d20 check, asked what class they might like to play, handed them a sheet and started running one of the starter kit games.
Hi Bowen! The Lazy DM's Companion and Uncovered Secrets Volume 1 include a "teaching new people" section you might want to check out. This video also covers the topic: https://youtu.be/yaRpkhrvLAU
Do you think there's an overemphasis on character class combat and party balance in D&D? The lesson I learnt from games like Morrowind and running an exclusively orc wizard party in the 3.5rd was that balance does not necessarily equate to fun. As you're wont to mention, DMs can alter things behind the scenes to ensure fun, and in my experience, having challenges the party are utterly unequipped for means more interesting solutions and roleplay.
Yeah, I don't hold too much weight into class balance in 5e. I know there are lots of debates but I don't see it at my table and I haven't seen it get in the way of most groups.
Hi, Mike, I'm an illustrator who would like to do freelance work for indie tabletop rpgs. I have seen many publishers say that they support artists and won't use Ai generated art for their works, but I haven't seen anyone say how they find illustrators. I was wondering where and how you and other independent creators/publishers find artists for your books?
Initially it's almost always word of mouth. When looking for an illustrator there are a few factors I look for and others look for. The first is their ability to capture the style we're looking for. That can vary widely but portfolios help a lot. The second is reliability. When I started using freelance illustrators for my book, I reached out to a few whose work I had seen in books I loved. I then sent art orders out to a bunch of them. Those who got the art back to me quickly got more orders. Those who didn't got fewer. Those who never got anything back didn't get anymore. That worked well for me and then I found some relationships with artists that worked really well so I went back to them often. When I'm looking for new artists, I'll ask other indie publishers why they recommend, take a look at their work, ask about their reliability, and go with that. I get a lot of unsolicited emails from artists seeking freelance jobs. The ones who send portfolios I keep in a list and then, when I need to reach out for something new, I'll go to that list. That said, right now, I have enough artists I've worked with to know their style and reliability and I go back to the ones I've used before. I know it's a rough job and I appreciate those who keep at it. Good luck!
TLDR: what do you think of the amount of work published adventures expect the DM to do? Im normally a homebrew campaign kind of guy, but recently picked up a Wotc published adventure (shattered obelisk) to run when I was a few players down as a "Disney+ show" vs the "feature film" so players didnt miss out on the main campaign. The idea being that I was paying a professional writer to do most of the "prep" for me so with very little notice, I could almost just pick the book up and play. However i have been left rather disappointed, Read aloud text doesn’t mention important aspects of rooms, size/shape, entrances/exits, or is written assuming the players enter from one entrance when there are multiple ways in. or descriptions of npcs are as simple as "A frail gnome" leaving quite a bit of work for the DM to fill in the gaps and i could see a novice DM struggle and feel short changed which could put new DMS off of playing, which is bad for everyone involved including wotc. what are your thoughts on the current state of published adventures, am i being unrealistic with my "pay to prep less" expectation? and do you think there needs to be a change in the way Wotc approaches creating their adventures to make them more usable? Possibly incorporating secrets and clues at the start of a section, or the A5Emm lore and behavior checks.
This article is ten years old but I think covers some of the conversation here: https://slyflourish.com/using_published_adventures.html The short answer is that typically published adventures don't take less time to prep than a homebrew adventure for a few reasons listed in the article above. Some adventures do a better job than others giving you what you need to run it easily but often at the expense of more detail. It's my opinion that the format for published adventures is an intractable problem. There's no ideal solution and the best ones probably only support the expectations of a small group of people. I think the best thing you can do is try out lots of different ones to see which formats you like the best – from big WOTC hardcover adventures to more episodic adventures to those done by Arcane Library which focus on brevity. And the answer may very well be that you prefer to run your own adventures. About half of GMs I've surveyed prefer to run their own.
What are your top five favorite adventures of all time? Any edition, any game, any publisher.
Oof. Top 5. i6 Ravenloft is my favorite. These others are in no particular order: Tomb of Annihilation White Plume Mountain Empire of the Ghouls Shadowed Keep on the Borderlands
Hi there! I'm a first time DM running Ruins of the Grendleroot (fantastic book!). We've done a few sessions, and I've noticed players tend to take turns interacting with me without paying attention to each other. Everyone's having fun, so I'm not worried, but it feels like they're missing out on some of the coolest parts of DnD! Are there tips or tricks you have to encourage players to interact or collaborate with each other, to make it feel more like a cooperative game instead of 5 "single player" games?
I'm honored you chose Ruins of the Grendleroot for your first time behind the DM screen! I answered a similar question in a previous episode of the Talk Show here: https://youtu.be/7bw-VTyCVsc?si=wWNXnFVNgGq5l0Ro&t=3760 I think this segment has the best advice I can offer. Good luck!!
I know most DMs put a serious amount of effort and thought into their games. That said, I have spoken to many of my players who have a fairly wide range of other DMs played for, and there are a lot of disappointing experiences. How do you approach a DM and tell them that you aren't having the kind of experience you expected, or maybe don't enjoy, without discouraging them from running the game entirely?
Hi Greg! This question has come up a couple of times before. Here's my advice on the topic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=2869s&v=X82OyqvRJA0https%3A%2Fyoutu.be%2FX82OyqvRJA0&feature=youtu.be Hope that answers the question!
Hi! When I think back to some of my favorite sessions over the last couple of years, I feel like that aside from big campaign ending battles, the sessions that stand out are usually social encounters. A few of these revolved around the idea of the characters as actors in a play or a gameshow in which the players were challenged to put on an extra layer of improvisation that isn't normally required. Do you have any ideas or resources for encounters that would scratch that itch?
I always fall back to considering the situation in the world. Interesting complex situations where the very thoughts of the NPCs can change depending on what the characters say often lead towards memorable encounters. The stakes need to be high, the motivations need to be clear, but then you drop behind the eyes of the NPC and the players drop behind those of their characters and you all see where the situation goes. That's probably my most useful advice.
Hello Mike! Having listened to your recent discussions about how to approach high lethality style RPGs, especially relating to your experience running Shadowdark RPG, I keep thinking that these games would lend themselves to West Marches style campaigns (at least in terms of content structure, not necessarily organizing play). This is not a campaign style that I have heard you talk about much, and I'm wondering if you have any experiences you could talk about, and Lazy DM strategies you can share regarding WM? Cheers!
Hi there! I really don't have any West Marches experiences but I've heard Kelsey, the creator of Shadowdark, describe using them for her games so I know it works well with them and may have even been built with that in mind.
Hi Mike. I was curious how you balance multiple story arcs throughout a campaign. I think you mentioned somewhere that you had multiple character based story arcs intertwined in your Empire of the Ghouls campaign. The villain in our campaign, who is progressing his own plans, is coming to a point where some of those plans will come to fruition. I'm struggling with "announcing" those plans when the PC's are in the middle of another story arc. I'm worried that may seem railroad-like if I throw a hook out there that they will feel inclined to investigate and move off of what they are currently on. My goal with the villain's plans was to keep him going in the background, and thus in the PC's consciousness, instead of having everything happen at the very end.
When and how to have villain plans move forward can be hard. You don't want players feeling like they have no good choice to make that doesn't lead to some villain moving forward. You also want the world to feel like its moving forward based on the choices they make. It's tough to balance. I don't really think of them as story arcs – they're just situations moving forward, for individual characters, the whole group, and everyone else in the world. A villain's plot moving forward also doesn't have to be a quest hook. It can just be something they learn is going on but can't deal with right away. It can definitely be trouble if the players constantly think they should be doing something else than the thing they're doing right now. So I don't have a perfect answer for you other than to keep these things in mind when you're moving your villainous plots forward.
How would you apply the lessons you've learned running Shadowdark, adjusting the game to incorporate factions and other changes, to plan and begin a new Shadowdark campaign with that foundation in place?
I would probably offer three factions for the starting characters and ensure the quests were tied to those factions so new characters would begin already tied to those factions. You could also have each of the characters choose their own factions as long as the quests are relatively in line.
No question that you haven't already answered elsewhere so I'll just pop in to say thanks for continuing the Lazy RPG Talkshow. I look forward to it every week!
Thank you so much!!
How do you keep the risk that bad rolls will kill a character, which is a source of dramatic tension, while also manipulating the dials to keep a battle at the right difficulty?
You really have to ask why you're changing the dials and remember that the dials are intended to be at the average and resist being turned unless you really need them for a particular thing. We don't turn the dials to save individual characters but we might turn them if a monster's story doesn't fit its mechanics. I very rarely use the dials to turn down damage unless a published monster just hits way too hard for its intended challenge rating. One of the Agdon Longscarf, a CR 2, was doing twenty damage per turn – that was too much, so I had him only make a second swing if he missed the first. Otherwise, I don't pull attacks if its deadly. Now on deadliness, I'll also telegraph to the players when things are really looking deadly before they start taking deadly blows so they know to react appropriately.
Hi Mike! I’m reviewing the Death Tyrant (Beholder) in the Monster Manual (p29) and comparing it to the “Monster Statistics By Challenge Rating” (p6) in the wonderful Forge of Foes. The Death Tyrant is a CR 14 large undead monster. While its AC/DC, hit points and proficient ability bonus are pretty much bang on the money in Forge of Foes, I’m having trouble gauging its damage output because of its random and multiple uses of eye rays that can hit 1–3 targets. These are the damaging rays (3/10) and their relevant 1d10 roll to get them. The other rays have debuffs or control effects. 5. Enervation Ray. DC 17 Con save or take 36 (8d8) necrotic damage. Half damage on a successful save. 9. Disintigration Ray. DC 17 Dex save or take 45 (10d8) force damage. Save or suck effect where the creature dies if the damage reduces them to 0 hit points. 10. Death Ray. DC 17 Dex save or take 55 (10d10) necrotic damage. Save or suck effect where the creature dies if the damage reduces them to 0 hit points. Then the Death Tyrant also has a bite attack with a lesser proficient ability bonus (+5) and a 14 (4d6) damage. I have no idea whether this monster punches above or below its weight. According to Forge of Foes, a CR 14 monster should be doing around 89 damage per round. Cheers from Iceland!
I'd probably divide up the average of their rays and see if three of those averages line up with the recommendation from Forge of Foes – it seems pretty good, really. Again, make sure to hang on with a loose grip! This math isn't perfect.
Hi Mike. AI tools - I use them a LOT. They are useful but a bit controversial. Google Bard is surprisingly good at generating short pieces of throwaway text. Book blurbs, descriptions of an improvised NPC, a script for an overhead conversation in a tavern. It also can generate ideas for adventure hooks, scenarios, puzzles, riddles... It's very powerful. Bing image creator is similar but for creating incredible location images and npc portraits. But i also feel 'cheap' using it. I couldnt justify paying a professional to generate this volume of material and art, especially since it is so well tailored. My question: is this the sign of things to come? Should we be concerned for the livelihood of artists and content writers? Are the days of paying for a 'dscryb' account over?
I am not a priest here to absolve you of your AI sins =) We each need to decide how to approach these tools. I both use them and am mad at them at the same time. I definitely feel like, moreso than a lot of tools, they got a free ride on our intellectual property. They indexed all of Sly Flourish without asking and use it to answer questions without attribution – they're not a strict public benefit. They took 20 billion dollars from Microsoft. Where's my $20? They claim they don't need our permission to use that material and also claim they'd be useless without it – which is it? Is my stuff valuable or not? If it's valuable, negotiate with me. Penny Arcade had a great comic about this: https://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2024/01/19/fypm Are they useful for prepping RPGs? They are for some – sometimes. They help me whip up tokens but doing an image search often does the same thing. So yeah, it's complicated, and we'll see how things turn out.
How/Do you work in character backstories in CoS? Just started CoS with the party being taken by the mists from around Daggerford. We had a great session zero developing character backgrounds using the Session Zero system, https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/mythicgrove/session-zero-system. However, now they're transported to a place unconnected to their background. Do I contrive connections between the two locations or just proceed with the CoS as written?
Curse of Strahd and similar adventures definitely put a character's background on the back burner. The background matters more for their approach than any sort of connections in the world itself since Barovia is its own fog-enclosed sandbox. Sometimes that's just how things work out depending on the style of adventure. If you find an opportunity to hook in a background – maybe an NPC the characters knew also made their way to Barovia – that can work but you might also just want to make it clear to the players that their deep backgrounds may not have as much play in the sealed world of Barovia.
Greetings! You’ve mentioned how much you enjoy one on one and solo rpg sessions. After having written Forge of Foes, are there any observations or additional advice you’d give for that style of play after having spent so long focused on 5e monster design?
I don't think anything specific from Forge of Foes changes how I think about solo games. In case you haven't seen it, here's my article on managing encounters for one-on-one games: https://slyflourish.com/balancing_combat_for_one_on_one.html
Hi Mike, I know you're not a fan of shopping sessions in D&D, and I've watched your previous Q&A's on the topic, but I'm curious to get your thoughts about this: I've been using some shops from the (excellent) "Wanderer's Guide to Merchants and Magic", and I'm debating the best way to convey the shops' inventories to the players. Do you tell them everything that's for sale, or perhaps hand them a list? Do you let them read full descriptions of magic items and their mechanics, or do you convey the items' properties narratively? Thanks for any suggestions!
I might cut them down to a handful of items. I like to roll randomly for maybe three items the merchants have on hand. For the Wanderer's Guide, I might print it out and hand it to players. It's ok to have a little bit of a slow session but don't drag it on. You can also run such scenes out of game so players can choose on their own time – even if their choices are retroactive should the game's timeline have moved forward a bit.
Hey Mike! I would be interested in hearing your thoughts how many/most official WotC campaign maps aren't tailored for printing out and running miniatures on them at actual home tabletops. Scale is often too big, no thought to how the layout could be broken down to print easier, lots of "dead" rooms or too narrow hallways - feels like very little level/gameplay design goes into 'em. I've always found it interesting how playtesting/level design for player experience in video game levels are universally expected, but seems like TTRPGs barely consider it even at the level of big names like WotC. Obviously budgets are different, but we're still just talking fairly simple top-down 2d maps (not big 3d environments with lots of assets) as an end product. Anyhow, feels like a missed opportunity (or maybe an opportunity for entrepreneurial map makers to supplement official content?) to better facilitate using miniatures at the tabletop. Cheers!
I rarely worry about WOTC published maps these days because it's been years since I've run a WOTC adventure outside of Light of Xaryxis. I have a few tricks for maps but people don't want to hear them – I'll state them anyway because it's given me peace: I like to blow up maps to be twice their normal size a lot of the time. I like big roomy maps where lots of characters and monsters can roam around. This means turning typical 5 foot per square maps into 10 foot per square maps. WOTC already has 10 foot per square maps a lot of the time so that works for me. If I feel like *those* maps are too condensed, I'll blow them up too. My big recommendation is to hang less onto the grid. Turn off the grid or use gridless maps if you can and remove snap to grid in your VTT software so tokens don't lock to squares that don't perfectly line up. This speeds things up tremendously when prepping a map. On the question of printing – yeah, there are hardly any good solutions for printing WOTC maps at the table. I just use simple drawing aids on a dry-erase map and make the best of it. https://slyflourish.com/drawing_maps.html
Cheers Mike I’m an aspiring TTRPG designer. What are your fave 3 mechanics or design thoughts from 5e or any other game you have played?
Woooo. Great question. Numenera and Cypher System have their 1 to 10 system for building any challenge is fantastic. It's so fast and easy and completely open and free for the GM. I love it. I think Advantage and Disadvantage from 5e are really excellent. It's fast and easy, a great and power improvisational tool, and a big mechanical effect. The Oracle system from Ironsworn is pretty great – a powerful tool for improvisational play I may change my mind!
Dear Mike, Thanks for spending so much time on my “dialogue options for NPCs” question a few months ago. That was a real treat considering it was my first question. My second question has to do with the lazy DM way for making monsters on the fly and character classes: Would there be lazy way to create character classes? I imagine this would be similar to using the “Monster Statistics by CR” chart, Common Monster Type Templates, and Common Monster Powers. But it would be for classes. The reason I’m asking is that I’m running a therapy group that teaches coping skills with D&D. The kids in the group aren’t interested in the standard classes and want to do some pretty wild things. I want to indulge their enthusiasm but I don’t want to make it OP as that would end up not being fun. I have already looked at flavoring existing classes like the Moon Druid and Artificer. But the Forge of Foes book has been so incredibly helpful in running monsters that it got me thinking about customizing classes for these kids. Thanks for you help. —DnDBT Joe
In the Discord server I brought up my desire for a Forge of Heroes book – a book that lets you build characters from the ground up the same way you can build monsters with Forge of Foes. Very lightweight, very easy to do. The closest I saw to this idea is Core20 by Scott Gray (https://core20rpg.wordpress.com/blog/the-core20-playtest/). You can also try something more open-ended like Fate Core or Fate Condensed which I like a lot and lets players build characters any way they wish. You can still use it for D&D style games but with much more open ended character design. Fate Condensed is excellent: https://fate-srd.com/fate-condensed https://evilhat.com/product/fate-condensed/
Shadowed Keep on the Borderlands by Raging Swan Press - you've spotlighted it and have mentioned several times about "my Shadowed Keep on the Borderlands game" and so forth. Are you running that more or less as is - a thing for 1st through 4th level characters or are you allowing for more content past 4th or something else? I'm asking because it looks cool (like most of the Raging Swan stuff) and if you've figured out ways to make it even bigger / better - I'm always interested in info like that. Thanks much!
My Shadowed Keep game is so far off the rails. We're only now about to get to the shadowed keep after months of playing and they're way higher level than the location. I also added two factions of bad guys who are taking over. The whole campaign is built on a different premise – the idea that multiple cults of multiple demon princes want to open the doors to the Black Cathedral – a gateway to the layers of the Abyss. So yeah, its totally off the rails. I find that adventures like this work really well as frameworks we can hang our own custom adventures on and that's how I'm using Shadowed Keep.
I'm running two homebrew campaigns and I find myself frequently getting "writer's block" in trying to decide what to do in the next session. I've got all your books and hundreds of other books and feel overwhelmed in trying to find just the right scenario. Any tips for writer's block/GM decision paralysis?
There are a few things that may help. A big one for me is to get into the heads of the villains and see what they're doing – then break that down into quests the characters can grab onto. I think that RPGs can be like writing in that ending partway through an adventure gives you a solid strong start about where you're going next. Instead of trying to think up the single perfect path, try to write down ten potential paths, locations, or quests and then choosing three you like. You can always fall back to published works for this. The Lazy DM's Companion has pages of quest models and random tables for building adventures around particular types of arcs – its also available in Uncovered Secrets 1 as a Patreon reward. Roll some dice and see what ideas it gives you.
You've mentioned a list of subclasses that you don't allow in your campaigns. I'm about to do a session zero for a campaign and would like to exclude those subclasses. One is Twilight Cleric. What are the others?
Right now it's only twilight and peace clerics but lately I don't even bother with Tasha subclasses and instead offer character options from other books like Tome of Heroes and Midgard Heroes or others.
Hi Mike! Apologies in advance long post--but I think it is an interesting time study of a recent 5e combat I was a player in ( I rarely get to be a player!) Quick share of the situation-5 Level 5 PCs & 3 sidekick NPCs in a large scale ship to ship pirate combat (enemies are a dozen thugs, a Battering Ram Ogre, Archer, and a couple of CR 6 Mages) on two ship battlemats. My PC is a Cleric of Nature with 38 HP, initiative in the middle of the order. 5:58pm Begin of encounter/ Set-up mat and minis 6:09pm Rd 1; 11 minutes after begin of encounter- My PC dashes to exit our ship and swim, drinking my potion of Flying 6:27pm Rd 2; 18 minutes later- My PC does Dash movement flying around enemy pirate ship to get to the back of it where the rudder and rowers are 6:48pm Rd 3; 21 minutes later- Move and cast Wind Wall to take out a few of the pirates running the ship--My PC gets hit with 5 magic missiles at once from CR 6 Mage NPC afterwards, (using its Level 5 spell slot) and she takes 18 Damage. 7:10pm Rd 4; 22 min later - My PC's second wind wall is Counterspelled and afterwards get shot by an CR 3 Archer NPC and dropped to zero while in flight (two longbow attacks +Archer's Eye). My PC fails 1 death save in fall after falling 20 feet. 7:34pm Rd 5; 24 min later - My PC fails Death save roll #2 7:59pm Rd 6; 25 minutes later – My PC makes Death Save #3 8:15pm Rd 7; 16 minutes later - My PC makes Death Save #4, get tied up by the Mage 8:28pm Rd 8; 13 minutes later – I make a final death save, Mage gets critical hit by dwarf fighter ally who grabs my PC and carries her away to safety. 8:45pm Rd 9; 17 minutes later- session ends at round 9 cliffhanger as the enemies destroy our ship and leave us out to sea to sink. So essentially, my PC spent an hour and 20 minutes of real world time just making Death Saves, and for nearly 3 hours of an epic combat really just did a Wind Wall once, (hilariously ineffective I know!) No issue with the way the combat unfolded mechanically-- sometimes dice and game state resolution play a part---(It also seems utterly ridiculous that all of the above also encompassed less than a minute of game world time, 9 rds x 6 seconds = 54 seconds but that is another matter entirely). This weekend I am running my first ever 5e combat for five level 11 PCs invading a Lamia's Lair. (Using the Lamia's Job from Fantastic Lairs as a reskin template) I am just curious about how time unfolds at your table for sessions. The questions being -For Tier 2+ boss / Hard to Deadly encounters of 5 players & 1 DM, do you think that a player waiting 15-18 minutes for their next turn is average? -What steps of the 8 Lazy DM would you emphasize or eschew to reduce time between turn for a gridded combat game? Sorry for the wall of text, just wanted to give you the details and time study for context. Cheers!
That's just bananas. A friend of Wolfgang Baur described D&D as five minutes of action in a four-hour bag and that's definitely a concern GMs should be aware of. There are no specific steps of the eight steps to counteract that but there are some other things you can do: - have fewer players - run at lower levels Those are hard rules that definitely speed up play. A GM who isn't aware of how important pacing and beats are to the game. This is why I like the luck system so much. If you fail an attack or save, you get a boost for next time, and one the GM doesn't have to worry about. But yeah, some GMs are just not great at managing things like this and in my close to 20 year group, I've definitely had problems where players are like "hey, I just spent a 4th level spell on this, how can we make sure I didn't just waste it?" It's a hard thing to manage. Hopefully GMs are up for the feedback when things like this happen.
Why Shadowdark? I was trying to setup a game with my regular players and they asked this. "What can I do in Shadowdark that I cannot do in 5e or one of the other OSR games that we played?" So my question is, what is the hook for Shadowdark, what is it about, and why is it different than some other systems.
Shadowdark isn't a matter of having things or doing things that you can't do in 5e – Shadowdark is about playing the game from a different perspective, one where specific resources are more of a concern, where things are more dangerous, and where the shadows constantly threaten the light around you. Some players are just not into that and that means Shadowdark probably isn't for them, but I think it's important to recognize that. Page 7 through 10 or so of the quick start guides are very easy to read and digest and get the point of the game honed down. I'd describe that and see if people are interested.
My question boils down to this (see below for context): How you would modify the Lazy DM approach for NEW dm's, and/or for prospective DMs who haven't even played D&D before? I know you've mentioned in the past you don't have much advice for running D&D with kids, but please hear me out!! I'm a children's librarian collaborating with our adult services department to host a program teaching families how to run their own D&D games at home. What are some key points I can make without overwhelming them with rules, reference books, preparation, etc.? It's an amazing hobby and I want to shout it from the rooftops, but it can be a tough sell if presented the wrong way, and even then there is usually an intimidating (or supposedly intimidating) learning curve.
I think, and I've heard others state, that beyond learning the basics of the game itself, the eight steps are good whether you're just starting out or have been doing it 50 years. I don't think there's a more new-DM friendly way to approach things, really. Some of the concepts take a little work to understand, like abstracting secrets and clues, but I don't think there's a set of training wheels to get you there. I think knowing the characters, having that strong start, understanding potential scenes, writing down secrets and clues, notable NPCs, monsters, locations, and treasure help at any point. I do have advice for new DMs in general which you can find here: https://slyflourish.com/getting_started_with_dnd.html
Hi Mike. I’m working on some ideas for my first dungeon and would love to have an obstacle similar to the Chompers from the film Galaxy Quest somewhere in there, but I’m unsure of how to actually build it. Do you have any suggestions on how to implement something like that, preferably in a way won’t involve an insta-kill after a single bad roll? Thanks so much!
The whole question about why the chompers are there is brought up in that very scene – why are they there in *your* game? If you're looking for some ideas, check out the classic adventure White Plume Mountain that was written original as a resume of crazy trap ideas but turned into a whole adventure. Tomb of Annihilation also has some fun dungeon traps to explore.
Hey Mike, I will be starting a game where most of the players are newbies so my question is: How do you help a brand new player chose a class to play?
Good question! I think its worth telling them what the core thing is for each class and letting them decide. You could strip things down or break things out by the four core classes first and, if they don't get overloaded by that, describing the remaining classes. I really think pregens help for new players. They can always switch to a custom character when they get their feet under them.
Hey Mike, my group recently switched our dnd campaign to biweekly to try some new systems in the weeks between. I am worried that they might forget a lot with a longer time between sessions. Do you have any tips for helping players remember previous sessions and things about the campaign when running bi-weekly games?
It's definitely a risk! I find it really useful to just jot a few bullets down in my own notes about what happened after a game session. I'm not fantastic at it but I bet it would help a lot. You can also ask your players to take notes – it's probably my biggest recommendation for players to more deeply enjoy the game and it would definitely help get people on the same page when switching to and from a game. We're thinking about doing this exact same thing in my Wednesday game and I worry about the same thing.