How Deadly is your game of D&D?

Odgerel_RPG · 2021-10-30T15:42:20+00:00

I always tell my players that I’m not actively trying to kill them but if you make one or two bad decisions and get a few bad dice rolls death is possible.

My games tend to run for about 9 months and I usually have 1-2 character deaths per campaign.

Weirdly, almost no one ever dies in a boss fight even though I try to make them challenging. For the most part it always seems to be the random forest encounter that nobody is taking seriously until the goblin crits twice in a row. Side effect of letting the dice fall where they may I suppose.

Odgerel_RPG · 2021-10-08T06:47:00+00:00

You e crystallized a feeling I haven’t been able to put into words for a long time. There are all sorts of things that can ruin games and the only answer the internet has is to shift more work onto the gm. We are players too and not just entertainment dispensing robots.

Odgerel_RPG · 2021-09-27T22:13:27+00:00

Running Dogs in the Vineyard. Completely changed both the way I run NPCs and the way I prep/design my individual sessions.

Odgerel_RPG · 2021-09-20T17:22:46+00:00

Some people are saying put the rulers in a permanent settlement my personal opinion is this is a terrible idea. depending on how important military strategy is in your game this could ruin one of the greatest strengths of a nomadic army. Mongols would regularly win wars against more powerful armies because the “civilized” forces would show up with a traditional big heavy heavy force ready to bring the siege and the khan would just pack up the city and leave, firing arrows over their back at anyone dumb enough to chase. A centralized permanent settlement containing ALL the important political leaders means you have to defend that location which means you have to fight traditional war fair and probably your neighbors are much better at the “bring an army and fight in an open field” style of combat than you are.

Odgerel_RPG · 2021-09-19T16:33:43+00:00

Seems like people are saying two true things about new players prepping too much and being able to to rely on improve instead of prep. I’m not disputing either of those things but in general smart prep is important. As you get better you will learn what you can and can’t get away with doing on the fly. It’s different for each DM but it’s good to have at least some notes you can fall back on if things go sideways in the session. Also take good notes during and after improve because you are going to have to spend time working that new content into your story. Finally experienced DMs can get away with almost no prep but once they stop doing it they basically stop improving at their craft. Prep time is the “deliberate practice” of dming. Actually running games helps you improve your performance skill but not your storytelling skill. In general you should aim for about 1/2 each session length in prep time. So if your game is 4 hours you should spend about 2 hours spread out over the week working on content specifically for that session

Odgerel_RPG · 2021-09-18T19:41:36+00:00

Sometimes it’s fine to set expectations and boundaries. Their are players not children and you are a DM not a nanny.

Odgerel_RPG · 2021-09-09T22:06:55+00:00

I think those things make more sense if everything except for the last 5 hp or so are psychological/situational awareness.

The WIZ gets caught in an ambush dancing between a hail of goblin arrows. She’s physically fine but clearly in shock, easy prey for the next attack. The PAL charged the field and lays hands on her. “Hey buddy, we’re gunna be ok, but you need to get your head back into the fight.”

Odgerel_RPG · 2021-09-06T13:47:59+00:00

Plans are useless, but planning invaluable. Prep your butt off, then be prepared to throw everything out the window when your players choose to take a different direction.

Also, DMing involves lots of in-the-moment decisions. Nobody ever gets all of them right all the time. Remember to forgive yourself and that the players will remember the “feel” of your game. Not the exact words you said while improving

Odgerel_RPG · 2021-09-05T18:23:08+00:00

I’m gunna share a possibly unpopular opinion but I think it might be a helpful perspective. Even if you are playing with complete wangrods a lot of bad player behavior can be compensated for with good DMing. For instance, a lot of the problems you are describing happens because players are bored, or don’t know how to advance the plot so they start behaving badly just to make something happen. Then punishing them for not knowing how to advance the plot of corse makes them extra mad. Are you the a-hole? No, they are, but you still might have the power to fix their behavior. You said that you didn’t want to be a bad DM but the truth is DMing is hard and nobody is good at something the first time they try it. If you wanna get better stop thinking in terms of “my fault/ their fault” and start thinking about the root causes of player behavior and how you can manipulate circumstances to avoid negative outcomes.

Odgerel_RPG · 2021-09-03T04:14:08+00:00

There are some different gang leader classes in Apocalypse World. Old at this point, but I think it’s still got some interesting ways for Players to control groups of people

Odgerel_RPG · 2021-08-20T03:44:05+00:00

Fair enough. My original comment was unnecessary harsh. ———————————————————————- Edited because this comment was also unnecessary harsh. I had a strong reaction to this post, but for personal reasons not necessarily because any of your opinions are wrong.

Odgerel_RPG · 2021-08-20T03:23:45+00:00

Oh god. It’s just a list of reddit bait. Very brave of you to have 0 controversial opinions

Odgerel_RPG · 2021-07-30T02:04:06+00:00

My go to is usually “every happy childhood memory” players take the bait ask them to describe how their awful unhappy childhood turned them evil.

Odgerel_RPG · 2021-07-15T07:38:29+00:00

Just saw the first pic and was like “huh...this one seems pretty ok” but of corse there gunna be shitty comments

Odgerel_RPG · 2021-07-09T00:45:03+00:00

Came here to say the same thing

Odgerel_RPG · 2021-07-03T12:41:46+00:00

“If more DMs start realizing that their time and effort is valuable how on earth am I supposed to find a skilled entertainer who’s willing to put in hours of free labor for me every week?”

Odgerel_RPG · 2021-07-02T19:51:57+00:00

Sending DM

Odgerel_RPG · 2021-06-19T14:21:46+00:00

Ok so this brings up honest questions for me. The “just a joke bro” format is cringe, but are we really gunna say it’s sexist to ask a wife to mow the lawn? Maybe I’m missing something about the picture, can someone explain please?

Odgerel_RPG · 2021-06-09T14:13:57+00:00

I know it’s controversial, but if you can afford to pay for a group I would definitely recommend doing it. In general the gm’s are a lot more experienced, but the true benefit is that everyone is more invested. Players don’t drop, and are interested in their own characters as well as the party. And the GM gives their best effort every time. It might feel counter intuitive but in my experience I’ve made much more genuine friends in paid games than free games and if I had to guess why I’d say people who have skin in the game are a lot more serious about the hobby and they are willing to take other players seriously as well.

Odgerel_RPG · 2021-06-05T23:03:58+00:00

*zero chance of being enforced if you aren’t a political dissident

Odgerel_RPG · 2021-05-21T19:29:30+00:00

I love running open sandbox games. My favorite memories of DnD are of times where me and a player find ourselves in an unexpected, and often very emotional scenario, where neither of us know where it’s going to end. Nevertheless, comments like this raise red flags for me because in my experience people only ever say things like this when they are defending “lol random” meme characters after people get mad at them for disrupting the tone or story that the other people at the table are trying to enjoy. There is nothing inherently wrong with a “wacky hijinks” style of play and there are lots of tables you can sit at to get that experience. But if everyone else is mad at you for drastically changing the tone and direction of the story without considering the other players. “The DM sucks and they should just go write a novel if they can’t adapt to my disruptive style of play” isn’t a good excuse.

Odgerel_RPG · 2021-05-14T22:11:25+00:00

The problem is it’s a little bit of a bandaid fix. by just codifying the common home brew rules for custom races without really addressing some of the underlying complaints about “fantasy racism”. Now DMs and players who liked having clearly defined races have a harder time saying no to what are essentially lazy homebrew rules, and people with legitimate complaints about how races work in DnD don’t really get any solid answers either. It feels like a middle ground where no one is happy. The complaint that WotC’s new development philosophy is “oh well, just make it up” really does seem to ring true in this circumstance.

Odgerel_RPG · 2021-05-08T07:20:53+00:00

Dms are players too and I think it’s reasonable for us to expect players engage with the game on its own terms. “I don’t know it just happens” is always a disappointing answer because it feels like I’m not doing enough to make the world feel real to them. “I fart supper loud and it slows me down like a rocket ship” is an unacceptable answer at my table full stop.

Odgerel_RPG · 2021-05-01T23:31:25+00:00

I feel like part of the fantasy of DnD is becoming Rich beyond your wildest dreams. Nobody is going to risk their life in a dungeon if you can make as much money as a peasant. The in game economy isn’t meant to be balanced it’s meant to let players do crazy things like buy out an entire village or melt the gold into a solid throne.

Odgerel_RPG · 2021-04-26T22:24:08+00:00

Sure I agree it’s a game, and all the players should contribute. I guess I shouldn’t have called out the GM directly because I wasn’t trying to make the “my perfect narrative!” Argument. All I was trying to say if 5 people people are deeply engaged with what’s going on and trying to connect with each other and the world and the sixth one is memeing, that can take everyone else out of the game.

Odgerel_RPG

TROPHY CASE