D&D Sage Advice

About to start streaming Dragon Talk w/ @JeremyECrawford. We'll talk DM Etiquette first, then open Q&A on #dnd to
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that which is going well it’s adenylate
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the exact same date and week that tomb
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coming very soon coming very soon we
have a physical copy in the in the
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stocks here oh one thing we doing this
break here will definitely go in grab it
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right now very cool stuff and Jerry you
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touches on Zanna thar’s we got our
proofs back from from the printer yes I
just approved the final changes and now
we’re waiting to see what those
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they will hit print in their massive
printer
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know a lot of people are excited about
all the player options as well as the DM
options in that book me me included yes
I already am using some of the tools
that are in that book nice good stuff
alright cool well thank you guys so much
for bearing with us on these
announcements we’re gonna get right into
recording a sage advice segment right
about now you’re good nice you could
hear a little click hello and welcome to
sage advice a segment of the dragon talk
podcast in which we delve in deep to
parts of the Dungeons & Dragons rules
and talk about kind of the intent and
the design behind them as well as tips
that you can use and I’m here with
Jeremy Crawford hello everyone how you
doing I’m doing great
you excited to jump into DM etiquette is
what we call this this topic of how to
use rules that are in the game to kind
of deal with problems that kind of arise
for janta masters like problem players
or situations that are hard to diffuse
yeah yeah or and sometimes people will
talk about this area of the game as
table rules so rather than being the
rules for the system it’s really how do
you run your game table yeah and also
how do you use the rules at the game
table both as a Dungeon Master and as a
player so yeah when you and I were
talking about this I was thinking well
is it really enough for us to talk about
and then I was starting to jot down
notes as like oh wait there’s plenty to
talk yeah right because because there
are a lot of things that dungeon masters
do to keep a table running that often we
as DMS aren’t even aware that we’re
doing it or that we have different
methods of keeping the game moving
keeping our players happy making sure
looking up rules doesn’t cause
everything to grind to a halt all of
these things sort of flow into the art
of the dungeon master so the thing I
wanted to lead with is first off because
I am a big proponent of diems in
particular doing as little work as
possible at the table itself yes and and
even away from the table I often where I
often recommend that DMS so that they
avoid burnout so here also right away
stop so this isn’t even a table rule
this is just a DM etiquette rule for DM
make sure you don’t burn out as a DM
yeah this is a hobby for those of us who
love playing and DMing D&D try if you
can when you’re preparing for a session
try to limit your preparation time to no
more than half the length of the session
you’re expecting to run so let’s say
you’re planning on running a four hour
session try to spend no more than two
hours preparing for it now many of us
because we love building worlds and
creating maps and coming up with
Pantheon’s of gods will spend way more
time than that yeah but although how I
kind of rationalize as a DM when I’m
starting to spend a lot of time in
preparation how I rationalize spending
all that time as I separate out my world
building time from my session
preparation time yeah because there are
two different parts of not even the
brain but just of like what you need to
get in in in your brain so like world
building you could spend hours and hours
and hours yes and that’s always good
because the more you think you know
about that world the better in general
right you don’t want to spend too much
time of stuff where people aren’t
necessarily going to explain but at
least it goes in the in the brain matter
and you can access it later and if
you’re running if you’re running
published adventures rather than
spending your time world
you could spend that time reading The
Adventure you’re going to run you could
spend that time reading up about the
world you’re running your adventure and
so if you’re running you know say storm
Kings thunder or soon tomb of
annihilation you could be reading up on
the Sword Coast or unchilled and if
you’re creating your own world again
you’re you’re creating all of these
details and why not that to me is
separate from the prep you do for a
particular session like okay what’s
going to happen in tomorrow’s D&D
session yeah and getting ready for that
and that’s the kind of prep where I’m
like try to keep it so that you’re not
spending too much time on that partly
because you can never predict everything
that’s going to happen and I find dm’s
will often end up preparing way more
than they need to which is not a
terrible thing but again with the goal
of making sure this still feels like
it’s a fun hobby for you you don’t want
to burn out just so it keeps being a
delight for you yeah because the last
thing you want to do is prep like ten
different scenarios but like well I’m
sure my players will pick one of these
ten scenarios and you spend through four
hours building those ten scenarios and
of course they do the eleventh scenario
that you didn’t anticipate and they’re
like well what did i do all that for
right and that’s that’s also why I’m
also so one of my other table rules that
I would give to DMS and really this is
advice this is not a rule yeah is try to
let none of your preparation go to waste
and so let’s say the players run off and
do something that you never expected and
you you spend all your prep time
preparing for them going to the temple
of darkness and they decided to dash off
to the temple of light and you have
nothing prepared for it first off just
be comfortable winging it because the
thing that dm’s often forget is the
players have no idea what you prepared
and they have no idea what’s behind your
DM stream it’s not like they’re over
your shoulder oh when are you gonna get
this into the campaign and and into anis
in essence you’re never doing it wrong
if you put something in front of them
that you didn’t prepare because they
don’t know you didn’t prepare it
what matters is just simply that
whatever you put in front of them it’s
fun it’s engaging them and it’s giving
them a deal
experience that they’re gonna remember
or at least just you know have a ball
with that afternoon or that evening when
you’re playing is there a corollary to
that in which you don’t Telegraph that
you just are making this up like don’t
Telegraph that you’re winging it oh I
always as a DM basically try to have a
poker face and I I will present
something I painstakingly prepared
sometimes for weeks in advance I will
present it the same way I present
something I made up on the spot I try to
just as I’m delivering the story I’m a
storyteller
what matters is delivering that story it
doesn’t matter if I made up element B
two seconds ago and I’ve been planning
this other element for six months
right right the goal is just weave it
all together because again there’s no
need for you as a DM to be nervous they
don’t know what’s in your notes I like
that you mentioned is a poker-faced
thing too because you know in poker
there’s the if you’re bluffing you
sometimes show that you Bluff just to be
like hey I was bluffing so you knew that
I were bluffing that sometimes you don’t
show even if you have this stuff for
that reason to keep that mystery and I
do that as a DM sometimes to where I’m
like you know how after a session I’ll
be like I’d totally just wing that and
they’re like what oh my gosh that’s
crazy and then other times would be like
you know I’ve been prepping that for
weeks the thing that I just made up out
of money but and you know and so like
you keeps them guessing a little bit and
a funny anecdote with this is currently
Chris Perkins is playing in my campaign
but in fourth edition I used to play in
his and and it’s funny actually he and I
sit we’re in the same like relationship
to each other at the table as we were
back then because when I’m deeming he
always sits to my immediately to my
right so he can kind of see over my DM
screen yeah
and when our fourth edition game I was
often sitting also right next to him and
could see over his DM screen and Chris
often does this where his poker face is
he’ll look down at his paper like when
something happens like you know someone
said oh I meet this NPC and he’ll look
at a paper as if he’s looking at the
NPC’s name and I’ll look over it’s like
there’s nothing on that piece of paper
on the spot that’s a part of the magic
of D&D yes
it again all your players care about is
that it feels like a cohesive story
sequence of events and locations they
don’t know where it came from
now I mentioned before I like also to
make sure preparation doesn’t go to
waste
yeah so if you spend a bunch of time
preparing something as long as you don’t
get too wedded to the particular way in
which you prepared it like I mentioned
before they they decided to march off to
the temple of light and you prepared the
temple of darkness well in some cases
you can take the preparation you did for
something else and just rapidly reskin
it for another situation yeah like okay
temple of Darkness was filled with bad
guys and they were gonna fight them and
it was gonna be a traditional dungeon
slog Oh God there instead they’re going
to this other temple and I don’t even
know what’s really there how but it’s
filled with the same bad guys and so
then you could just take your prep that
you did for something else and dump it
simple and in another location usually
though what I do is I’ll take something
I prepared that we didn’t end up using
it and I’ll end up using it many
sessions later yeah and and we’ll often
you know reskin it or another thing I
love is especially if you’re designing
wilderness situations because they’re
not you know you’re not walking down
fixed corridors and whatnot and you
might have thought okay if they go down
this particular road they’re gonna come
across this strange forest shrine where
they’re gonna hear the whispers of an
old god oh darn they never went down
that road but again they don’t know what
road that’s true that shrine is on so
you in play you can just take it and
move it someplace else
and I would even recommend two DMS be
this free-flowing even when you’re
running published adventures and using
an established world like The Forgotten
Realms what I often like to remind DMS
is the moment you start using a
published adventure and have your
players step into a world like the
Forgotten Realms or Grayhawk or
Dragonlance or Eberron or any other D&D
setting yeah at that moment it becomes
your world and the publish adventure
you’re running is your adventure and
it’s gonna be unlike even if you run it
exactly by the book because of the
choices your players are gonna make it’s
going to be unlike anyone else’s version
of it and so I really encourage DMS
grasp onto that freedom grasp onto the
fact
that it’s going to be a unique
experience for you and don’t fret if you
realize after the fact like you reread
through the adventure it’s like oh I
described this this fruit stall being on
the left side of the street and water
deep when in fact the adventurer said it
was on the right side everything I can’t
suspend my disbelief anymore yeah who
cares because again it’s now your
version of Waterdeep exactly and you
decide now in this instance of it it’s a
unique instance of Waterdeep it’s all
yours
you decide how things work there this is
also a great thing to keep in mind when
you have players who maybe have played
in one of these worlds for many years
sometimes for decades
you can often surprise them because
again the the timeline there in
basically is different from any anyone
elses now it gets a little trickier when
you’re running say like an adventurers
League artificial organized play then
because you’re trying to create this
sense of everyone playing in the same
instance of the world then people want
to keep keep a little closer to the text
but here’s the thing you can still
there’s a lot you can still play fast
and loose with at this most recent Gen
Con there was an adventurers League
adventure I was running it’s a lot of
fun it has a dinosaur race in it and in
an arena fight and and I ran that
adventure multiple times every time I
ran it I changed something in the
adventure the team that they were racing
against in the dinosaur race I described
them differently every time I ran it
mostly to amuse myself and my favorite
one was the final one where for whatever
reason I decided one of the racers had a
jack-o-lantern helmet on his head and
the players really laughed about that
about this dinosaur rider with this
jack-o’-lantern helmet I don’t know why
the heck I did it but I just decided on
the spot this guy has a jack-o’-lantern
helmet on yeah but none of the other
versions of the adventure I ran had the
jack-o’-lantern Hamlet I even sometimes
will change the genders of the
characters The Adventure you you go talk
to this NPC named pop mark Poe and it
said he’s with two women well I decided
and two young women I decided to know
one of them is a middle aged woman and
the other one is a young man
and suddenly turn those two characters
into sort of interesting and PCs for the
people to meet wait so again make it
your own
don’t let your preparation go to waste
so some other things for DM to do one
thing I love to tell my players
especially at conventions to try to keep
the game moving when it comes around to
their turn in combat is if players are
going to cast a spell in particular make
sure before your turn comes up to
already have your players handbook open
to the spell you’re going to cast yeah
or the spell card or the bell card or if
you’re using D&D Beyond have that you
know have your your screen you know with
that with the spell ready to go yeah
because often what will happen is
someone will say all right I cast gust
of wind and then we’re like what is it
do and so what does gust of wind do and
then saving throwing at me okay thou
let’s flip through it now they read it
then they discover it doesn’t actually
do what they thought it did yeah and
that’s almost like okay if you’re
playing a spell caster please read the
spell before you cast it and have it
open because often people will have
questions right you know and even if you
don’t have that stuff available to you
one thing I do in my character sheet is
take very brief notes on the spells so
you put like 60 feet that’s the range
you know if it’s a deck save just but
decks and just put like little notes
like that so like the major components
of you know it’s kind of like what the
top of the spells just covers does but
if you can make really tiny notes on
your on your sheet most of those
questions you know in play are gonna be
fine and you once you remember them you
remember them and it’s easy yeah yeah
absolutely
this can also this principle also holds
for complex class features so you know
there are some class features that can
be as complex as a spell you have some
of the channel divinity options that the
clerk and the paladin have again I’d
like my players to have it open
sometimes I mean I appreciate it
sometimes they imagine I have all the
book in my head and and I’ve seen
players do this with other DMS as well
surely mine DM knows how all this stuff
is right but then have you mentioned on
this segment many times before you have
the current version of the rules in your
head you have every play test version of
the rule
including other additions and other
additions plato’s rules in your head so
it’s very hard to be like what’s the
what’s the printed thing yeah I need the
reference right now and and what I’ve
noticed is that doesn’t happen only to
those of us who work on the game I’ve
actually seen a lot of people who’ve
played the game edition after edition
after Edition they’ll often be haunted
by how things used to work and not
realize it you know they’ll think oh
surely this is what this spell does or
surely this is how this works and it
turns out well it hasn’t actually worked
that way in D&D in about ten years
should I know why you think that shout
out to anybody in fifth edition’ who’s
called for a spot check listen check yes
for that reason occasionally someone
will talk about flanking but not the
optional role in the Dungeon Master’s
guide they actually mean flanking how it
worked in third and fourth additionally
yeah so it’s good to have the most
recent stuff at your fingertips yes at
least so that you can make combat go
faster now that said if you don’t have
it open and for whatever reason the
group is having trouble finding the rule
that they’re using one bit of another
good table rule is if it’s starting to
take too long
the key is for the DM to keep things
moving and to be okay with making a
rules call and and just being
comfortable with it and moving right
along now sometimes people will say okay
then the DM should write down how he or
she made that ruling and it must be the
same way forevermore I think that’s less
important what’s important is that just
things kept moving and people had a good
time because you might sometimes realize
when you go back to the books or think
about it some more like ooh oops maybe
that’s not a ruling I want to repeat
yeah that could be done differently like
yeah you start to edit yourself yeah and
and what’s important again is what’s the
story great the people laughs were they
scared if it’s supposed to be a scary
adventure was it dramatic if it’s
supposed to be a dramatic adventure the
end of the day in D&D there’s no special
prize for well I got every rule right
now that can be satisfying sure we
should give that prize but yeah you’re
right like it’s all about whether or not
the experience itself was fun and any of
the things we’re talking about are way
the experience can drag down yeah now
something else tie and this is gonna be
a 1 some people say this is a silly
table rule to bring up but I always like
to make sure even in convention games
that go over an hour in length always
have a break and I say that eight
because people have to go to the
bathroom people need to get drinks and
food but also people like to chat about
things other than the game I also what
part of my motive also of having breaks
is I find that the more often I give
breaks in a game the less likely people
are to spend time on their phones during
the game because often during those
breaks that’s when they catch up on
their texts that’s when they look at
their email that’s what they see what’s
going on in Twitter yeah so I have found
that actually the more I have some kind
of regular breaks the more there’s that
the less you experience people being
distracted during the play right just
okay let’s step away from the table for
a second let’s refresh our drinks yeah
and then and then we’ll keep going I
didn’t think about that before that’s a
very 2017 chip yeah for for Dungeons and
Dragons play but yeah and it’s something
again I’m very I’m very conscious about
and I do it even in convention play
unless I’m running a kind of a shorter
adventure but especially if I’m you know
running a three or four hour adventure I
will say all right I will usually have
several breaks right and let people know
like okay there’s gonna be break come up
in 15 minutes and that is enough
sometimes for people not have to be
checking their phone yeah yeah yeah like
sense yeah so something else that is a
really good table rule is outside of
combat where in combat
people have turns in a particular order
so you never have to worry about
somebody being overlooked but but when
it’s not combat when people are not
acting in turn order I think it’s
important for DMS to just remember that
everyone is there to play and everyone’s
gonna want a moment to say what their
character is gonna do and also they’re
gonna want to have a chance to to step
into the spotlight so one thing I do
very consciously when I’m running
non-combat scenes is make sure I do a
kind of fairly regular sweep around the
table to
to ask some form of the very basic
question in D&D and that is what do you
do and often players will just tell me
and I don’t have to do this so you know
it’s not artificial you don’t have to
officially go around and you know what
do you do great what do you return it it
happens very organically but sometimes
you’ll notice okay these three players
have been talking a lot in doing a lot
these others these other two or three
they’ve been kind of quiet and and and I
don’t know what their characters are
doing and so I often will will tell
actually people who are saying all right
you know we’re running over there and
then we’re gonna ask them this and okay
now we’re talking to this NPC
I’ll often put them on pause and then go
over to the other players and see okay
so what are you guys doing I also and
this is also a little tip I think is
great for DMS is when you’re doing that
outside of combat when characters are
doing different things sometimes in
different places because parties often
do split up outside of combat especially
if you’re in a city or a human kind of
non dungeon environment yeah
I often love to use that kind of focus
shifting right why switch from one
player to another to create mini
cliffhangers right so often you’ll have
I’ll have somebody say all right I’m
gonna go over and investigate that
bookshelf and I is Adm know okay the
cursed tome is in that bookshelf and so
I’ll say all right you go up and you see
this dark tome and they’re like all
right I reach up for it I’m like all
right Mary what are you doing and so I
will create these moments of tension
where suddenly they’re gonna have to
wait to find out what happens next
and so I try to do that throughout a
session and again one of the easiest
ways as a team you can do that is with
that focus shifting shift to another
character and that accomplishes so many
things at once because it ramps up
tension it makes people wonder what that
is why is there a dark tome and why did
he shift away from there and then it
also does what you’re talking about is
to make sure that the people who don’t
feel like they have a spotlight have the
spotlight for even a little bit but I’ve
follow-up question though so what do you
do when you ask someone what do you do
and they’re like oh I’m nothing I’m not
doing anything that’s fine now sometimes
I might have a leading question for them
like if I know there’s something that in
the
seen that their character would normally
be engaged about I might remind them of
that fact I also will sometimes fill in
those silences with a little bit of
extra description like oh because I have
a character who’s just sort of chillin
you know just taking things in well then
I will sometimes then throw in while you
stand there these are the things that
have yeah you notice X Y & Z and then
that’s a chance for me to work in some
exposition without an exposition dump
truck kind of backing in and you don’t
be so because that’s also when you break
things up like this it’s also a
technique for sprinkling environment
descriptions exposition NPC descriptions
in in nice little bite-sized chunks yeah
yeah and that also gets make sure it by
doing that description thing or like you
know sensory things such as like smell
or touch like it just it makes the world
feel a little bit more richer if you do
things like that even if it isn’t
necessarily exposition or important
details the fact that you’re just giving
them details makes it feel like oh I can
smell the meat cooking and then so and
and I hear the music playing from the
tavern across the way you know like
things that make it feel like it’s a
breathing world and that’s that’s often
some of my favorite stuff to describe is
I often when I’m DMing imagining myself
standing where the characters are and
then I just do this kind of panorama in
my head and yeah
what are they smelling what are they
hearing like a little movie montage
exactly exactly
now specifically about rules in the DM
mm-hmm some dm’s like to have house
rules and then also DMS will sometimes
be concerned about using particular
rules in a session so I have two tips
here okay if you’re gonna use a rule you
don’t normally use like let’s say you
know they’re gonna dive down into the
lost city that is that sunk beneath some
lake and oh boy there’s gonna be a lot
of aquatic combat potentially I always
try to think ahead in any in any
adventure I’m running and I think what
are the unusual rules I might be using
in this session and I make sure to
reread those rules before the session
so that I don’t have that awkward moment
at the table we’re like I don’t
understand that works
hold the ganger all right well we’re
pretending uh I’m just a regular D I say
this no but you’re right and then also I
mean it’s the same tip as for the
players is like have that open at your
table when you’re about to start that
session or you know flag door up on your
phone if you’re using DD beyond like
that kind of thing yeah now again like I
said before if you don’t read up on it
beforehand and you don’t want to take
the time to look it up during your
session just wing it make something up
and be willing to course-correct
after the session best not to do course
correction during the session we’re
suddenly like midway through you’re like
oh no let’s completely change how we’re
running this and then you know your
session turns into a a forum on the
rules and again that’s usually not why
people gathered around to play and then
it feels like you’re playing Calvin ball
so that’s what was there House Rules
yes many groups like to have specific
house rules that they reuse for an
entire campaign I think that’s great you
know big part of D&D is tinkering and
making it your own I recommend though
that groups trying to be as conservative
as possible about how many house rules
they use and the reason why I give this
suggestion is it’s very easy to have for
pardon me for house rules to start
almost like self-replicating where you
end up be if the gets too out of control
you can end up with a whole parallel
rule set and suddenly your players are
trying to remember not only how like the
game normally works but also how your
your customized version of the game
works so just as if let’s say we were
designing a special set of rules for one
of our settings we would want to zero in
on what are just a few new rules that
will really bring this setting to life
or this particular adventure location to
life rather than this whole
constellation of new rules like zero in
on what’s going to be the most impact
what’s gonna make your game feel unique
go for that with your house rules go for
a big swing basically don’t don’t like
sort of like you know I concur
I changed the bonus in this you know
one ability from you know my your shield
spells because I think shield is too
strong now does plus two instead of plus
five when you’re doing that kind of
micro tinkering yeah I mean sure if
that’s your bliss go for it
but again the cost is your you are
increasingly a number of things your
players are gonna have to track yeah and
so I’d say go for high-impact house
rules that really make your rule your
game feel special and often this is a
great thing to do when you’re doing a
special genre in their campaign let’s
say you decided we’re gonna do mythic
fantasy and our heroes are you know
they’re not just regular D&D characters
they’re figures like Hercules or and
whatnot and so you might decide that all
the characters start off with the
equivalent of one of the blessings and
other sort of epic item epic abilities
we suggest in the Dungeon Master’s guide
you might decide I’m giving those at
first level or something like them yeah
and that’s a great example of that that
would be a strong statement in your
campaign show right away this is how our
campaign is different without a lot of
kind of micro tinkering that a person is
going to have to keep track of I also
know also another reason why I caution
people about going to hog wild with
House Rules is often I will see people
creating House Rules to address what
they perceive to be gaps in the system
but often a rule does exist in the
system and often it’s though something
in the dungeon masters guide I noticed
that people often do not remember how
many options there are in the dungeon
masters guide I mean that book is kind
of bursting at the seams with optional
rules different ways you can adjudicate
things different tips for building
things so the game often already has
what it is you’re looking for so I’d
recommend just do a deeper dive and
there’s a good chance you don’t need to
do any work because there’s a good
chance we already did it for you yeah
and I would suggest a lot of people I
mean I know a lot people already have
the Dungeon Master’s guide and I’ve read
it and I consumed it but I think there’s
this idea that once you’ve read through
it it’s magic items and a few other
things that you need like reference on a
while playing in the session but there
you you are correct in that there are so
many variants and ways to think about
how to add on to this system with
examples that are throughout the entire
book that you’re right many people will
be like oh there’s no thing for that
well actually yes it’s on page 76 and
you just skim it over it because you’re
getting with a magic item section right
other touchmaster so yeah it is one of
the ones that where people are like oh I
don’t necessarily need that at the table
in normal play but it’s something they
think about when you’re prepping your
session or wanting to create a campaign
that feels very unique and and the
variants and options in the Dungeon
Master’s guide are great inspiration for
creating house rules of your own because
many of them are the the optional rules
in particular are basically house rules
that we created to say hey here’s one
way you could customize your game you
know one example that I talked about
recently in a Kotaku article is the
option in the dmg for not rolling
initiative for monsters just assume all
monsters roll to ten on their d20 and
add their decks mod and you can even you
could even write that in as their
initiative score on their stat blocks
and I love that too it’s like one less
role that you have to make especially
the beginning of the session and how
many times have you done it and you’re
like oh I forgot to roll for the
monsters after your like a round or two
in and you’re like oh they’re going
ahead of you guys and that changed
everything that has already happened
yeah and a lot of it’s happening and
what’s funny is a lot of those optional
rules in the Dungeon Master’s guide are
actually basically remnants of versions
of the rules we play tested so we we
came very close to printing an
initiative score in the monster stat
blocks in the monster manual so that
that initiative score tip in the dmg
actually arose from what almost made it
into the official monster manual because
after that long plate test feedback
there was a lot of material that was
just cut there was in between changed
right and then well and and a lot of
stuff we were testing internally that
actually never was in the public play
test because we were doing at the same
time the public play testing was going
on we were doing our own internal stress
testing and there were
all sorts of things we tested because we
were we were basically iterating through
versions of the rules faster than the
public could because right because we
also had to then process all the
feedback from the public so we couldn’t
send them out you know every week well
here’s yet another version of the rules
and as a plate says err it was very
tough to even keep up with the schedule
that you had yeah and so we were at the
same time just going cycling through
version after version after version and
then also debating different ways to do
things and this iniciative score option
was one of those things that it didn’t
it didn’t make it into the final version
but it came close and there the dmg cool
yeah well awesome these I feel like this
is a great kind of overview of stuff
that might have been overlooked in fifth
edition and ways to make your table
better I know thanks forfor extolling
upon makes a lot of sense yeah and as
always I’m now inspired to start deeming
more than I already do more do more
thank you so much Jeremy how can people
get in touch with you for more rules
questions the best way is on Twitter
where I am Jeremy Crawford awesome and
I’m at Gregg Tito you can ask me some of
these questions but most the time I will
just defer them to Jeremy but I’m happy
to answer any questions you might have
about dungeon mastering or anything like
that so thank you very much and we’ll be
back next week with another segment all
right thanks everyone
thanks excellent thank you people on the
twitch of course we were like oh we’ll
talk about that for ten minutes and then
we’ll open it up to Q&A it’s it’s 244
that was our sage advice Eggman but we
do want to open it up to some questions
to you guys I know we had a few that we
printed out from the last time we did
this but I’m always want to take some
more questions from you guys in the
twitch chat as well and shout out to you
guys I was paying attention you guys all
had really great conversation and tips
and things that you guys do at your
tables which I thought was really really
cool so good conversation and following
along I thought you guys did awesome so
yeah feel free to throw any questions in
there now use question in all caps so
that we can check it out at 3 p.m. we’re
gonna have Thomas boss sits here with
Shelley we’re gonna have that interview
segment he’s actually in the room right
now stare
and cursing now he’s throwing fire
rolling some dice at me but stay tuned
for that in about 15 minutes we’ll uh
we’ll get to him and pick his brain
about tomb of annihilation in every
winter
all right so Calvin Bala oh my gosh I
said I mentioned Calvin ball in this
segment I hope that’s what it’s actually
in reference to if not that’s crazy so
how is the DM do I try to speed the game
along between players feeling they need
to over prepare for every small
challenge or just exercising the
immunity of traveling / living all right
where’s the question how do I owe as a d
I’m like more tips on how to speed the
game along I don’t know what do you
think about that so I am a big fan of
describing montages – and then you know
speeding things along and I always look
for cues from my players to see what
catches their interest so if if they if
let’s say I start describing a city
street and anyone who’s played with me
knows I can get carried away because I
boy do I love describing places in D&D
but I often will do a lot of it up front
and this is actually a tip I could have
just given in the segment we just
completed right I will often give a big
description at the beginning of an
adventure to kind of get a feel from my
players because I will watch as I’m
describing what causes them to kind of
look more interested you know their eyes
will kind of glimmer with I want to say
I can tell they want to know more or I
can see they actually already want it
like they’re basically almost like
teacher teacher then when I ask a
question about something I just said and
so I will remember okay what caught
their attention and those are the things
I’ll then slow down on now in my home
group my players are great at just
slowing things down on their own and
this is why I have – I don’t know if
I’ve ever said it before on Twitch but I
have to be really careful if I ever have
shops around because my god to my
players love to shop and so anytime
shops are around I’m like we’re about to
lose 30 minutes of play time because
they’re gonna they’re not only gonna
want to buy things they’re gonna want to
talk to everyone who works in the shops
because they want to pump them for
information
so yeah watch our first watch out watch
every shot
aha we’re like just lean into it because
you know which is what I do so what that
the thing is is I take that as an
opportunity to have the NPC’s tell them
about the city basically I always look
for every moment in D&D to be a chance
to convey part of the story some some
world texture something that’s funny or
I’m often looking for the players to
basically feed me adventure ideas yeah
because often the things that they will
say they think is happening or the
things they say they want to learn more
about I’ll be like oh that’s a great
idea I’m gonna make that be what’s
happening
yeah and better than what I prepare yeah
and this is going back to the beginning
of your segment about not over preparing
it’s like yeah I just take the cues from
them almost like it’s a I don’t know if
you know you guys know about long-form
improv but like it so much just taking
the one thing and then you’re like all
right well that’s what the session is
gonna be about today so so why not yeah
I like that but yeah I think but
otherwise DMS if you want to just keep
things moving quickly and jump from one
scene to another there is no shame in
doing that because the the always
remember in a way you’re kind of it’s
almost like you’re the showrunner for a
TV show yeah and sometimes you know the
best written shows will slow down and
you really get immersed in a particular
scene with a particular group of
characters you might even have an entire
episode of a TV show that zeroes in on
almost one hour of real time then the
very next episode might basically show
months of time passing and there’s no
problem in D&D with basically changing
your time focus from one session to
another and in fact I think that’s one
way to keep a campaign feeling dynamic
and making it so that you basically
you’re always focusing on the good stuff
what if you have a campaign or show in
which the opening sequence is all about
establishing the space and how big
season they ping-pong all over the world
which is actually very D&D because that
does happen when you get to high levels
you get fly you get flying carpets you
get dragon friends and allies that you
can ping across the world it doesn’t
ever really was explained in Game of
Thrones yeah so you have anyone who
doesn’t know what we’re talking about
in the most recent season of Game of
Thrones apparently everyone learned the
teleportation spell and they are BAM
ting around
tips and westerns they can go blink of
an eye when it took seasons to get from
place to place now it takes good minutes
yeah good question thank you for that I
saw Noble in here that I definitely
thought was up here this one is from
Matt’s if we’ll get to one of those two
in a second but how do you deal with
someone claiming something is
overpowered so my response would be
different depending on context so if
let’s say they’re bringing it up at the
table at the game table I would say just
keep things moving away from the table I
would take a look at it and and see SDM
if I was truly concerned about it but at
the end of the day is diem really
concerned about player things that get
really powerful because the the thing is
is the DM can always adjust numbers up
this goes back to something I was saying
in the podcast segment then players
don’t know what’s behind the DM screen
players don’t know how many hit points
your guys have if suddenly the player is
is using some combination particularly
let’s say they’re multi classing and
they’re using feeds and they’ve stumbled
upon some combination that is crazily
effective and feels at the table like oh
this might be a little too powerful
mm-hmm thing is the DM can just increase
the monsters hit points by 25% you know
cause they’re DC’s to be higher cause
them to deal more damage the the DM
basically has a lot of dials to turn at
the game table that never have to be
visible to the players mm-hmm because
again what the DMS role is make sure
things feel dramatic make sure they feel
exciting right and the only danger I
would saying is ramping up HP is that
then each fight turns into
you’re just adding time to the end of
the fight and and that’s why I would
never recommend doing it across the
board as a rule right it’s always just
be in the moment mmm it always get a
read on the particular moment like let’s
say a fight you feel would be more
exciting if it had another round or two
of play then you can increase that dial
yeah
the flipside is let’s say it’s a slog
and let’s say each of your monsters
they’ve you know you’re the player
characters are whittling them away and
you have a bunch of guys who are down to
like five hit points six hit points
eight hit points the players don’t know
they have you know those that amount of
hit points left and I will often have
creatures like they’ll get hit by
something and it will leave them with
three high points remaining I’m like you
killed it Yeah right but if I feel like
no it’s not dramatically appropriate for
that then I will just go exactly by how
many points they have left and that guy
will still stand there right with the
three hit points and it’s not it’s not
quite fudging the dice it’s more just
like making things feel appropriate for
the encounter that you wanted to be yes
and also because I know some DMS who who
really like to play the game has written
and there’s and I’m fully I fully
support DMS who want to try to play the
game the way we wrote it yeah so this
next part is for you DM if you’re in
that position if you want to play the
game as it’s written you can rest
assured that modifying monster hit
points is playing within the rules
you’re not cheating as a team when you
do that because remember we give you in
every monster stat block the month that
monsters range of possible hit points
and the hip points printed in the stat
block is the average it’s what we expect
a typical version of that monster to
have and also frankly it’s what the
challenge rating is based on but if you
want to slide the points down or up
within the monsters range given by its
hit dice and its Constitution modifier
go for it yeah and you’re and you are
abiding by the rules when you do so and
it’s fine if if doing that cause would
technically cause the monsters challenge
rate
to go up or down because basically that
kind of thing all comes out in the wash
right don’t sweat it what’s important is
does the game feel right in the moment I
like and the final thing I’ll say about
overpowered there are some combos in the
game that are crazy good mm-hmm
however a lot of the time when I when I
or someone else in the team investigates
a combination that has been proclaimed
broken it’s going to destroy the game we
often find that the analysis is based on
forgetting a rule there’s there’s often
beats a rule somewhere in the game that
actually controls the overpowered thing
they’re talking about and so then we
look at and said well yes this is
overpowered assuming you’re ignoring the
rules yeah or it’s often based on math
mistakes we will often look at it and
then recreate the scenario they’re
talking about and we’re like yes this is
overpowered if you ignore arithmetic
numbers but but sometimes yes indeed
things are crazy good and and then I
just recommend it DM adjust things on
the fly now do you ever think you know
we’re only a five-minute so I feel like
I’m taking away from another question so
I won’t know after my follow up question
but we’ll save it for another another
time so there was one year oh yeah I
saved from last time yeah let’s see if a
player manages to get next to a sleeping
target why is it necessary to make an
attack against it with advantage as
opposed to it being an automatic hit
it’s a great question so the reason that
you still have to make an attack role is
that armor class doesn’t just represent
the ability of a creature to dodge out
of the way it also represents in the
case of you wearing armor the the
ability of your armor to blunt a blow
but in the case of a monster with
natural armor it also represents the
ability of their scales or some other
you know feature of their body to turn a
a blow into essentially a Miss cause D&D
abstracts a bit of the combat where
whenever you’re rolling to hit
you’re not just rolling to see if you
struck true you’re willing to see if you
struck true and dealt damn enough to do
damn it exactly because the the
assumption in D&D is you’re actually
often when the game says you missed you
might actually have made contact mm-hmm
you might actually have slammed your
sword onto the Dragons flank but the but
and I this is actually how I often
describe it when a person comes really
close to hitting you know like mitt
let’s say the armor class is 16 and they
rolled a 15 yeah often how I describe it
is actually they managed to make contact
but they didn’t hit hard enough yeah
they didn’t get through the armor or it
was deflected aside yes yeah it was
parry or right which wouldn’t do any
damage at all yeah so so it so the the
attack role is representing not only
accuracy it is also representing did you
strike well enough to actually deal
damage and so that is why even when
you’re when you’re striking at somebody
who’s unconscious you still have to make
that attack role and with advantage so
you were it’s very likely you’re going
to hit because again they might have
some defensive quality that makes them
very hard to injure okay all right I
mean I I’m thinking of previous editions
with the coup de Grasse could you know
that attack action and how was an
automatic hit and then he would roll
damage so that the the chance there was
how much damage did right well for me
that made sense because we’re like
pulling their hair and like trying to
slit their throat or something like that
so it was like are you pretty much
assumed of doing damage it was just like
how good you are at slitting someone Wow
which is a several dark yeah I mean
that’s that’s the kind of thing that
tried to get modeled right these rules
and so right I’ve had that moment of
frustration that I think the the the the
person who asked the question was it was
talking about in that like why what but
it once you realize you’re in the
context of a battle but things are
happening and each round is only six
seconds right you know you get only have
a small window of being able to actually
do the thing that you try
and and we’ve talked about this in
another segment if you do hit you know
let’s say it’s an unconscious target a
feature of the unconscious condition is
it’s automatically a critical hit so you
are you are doing extra damage this is
assuming you’re right next to the person
then then the damage you’re going to do
is going to be higher than normal now
outside combat there have been many
cases as d-m where I don’t have any dice
rolled particularly if if the person
that is is being attacked is kind of a
lowly NPC who would be unlikely to
survive the hit anyway mm-hmm I just say
it just happens whereas if it’s a a a
strong like it’s a monster or like a
dragon that’s sleeping and they got the
jump on it or somebody else and combat
hasn’t started yet I still make them
roll the to hit roll because it’s like
you know that dragon has those scales
that sleeping wizard you know might have
some defense and flames
yeah more difficult than just as simple
as you players want it to be right right
and also the thing is is as a story game
some of danby’s rules are not at all
about verisimilitude or things being
physically believable some of the rules
are based entirely about how important
ours is something to the narrative a
great example of this is the fact that
when player characters who are the stars
of the story yeah when they’re reduced
to zero hit points unless they’ve taken
massive damage they’re not killed by it
they’re knocked unconscious whereas
monsters they’re killed they’re killed
except we say in the rules but if it’s
an important NPC or you know a monster
that’s an important villain the DM can
opt to have them follow the same rule as
the player characters where they are
knocked unconscious instead of killed so
again that’s an example of a rule that
has nothing to do with the physical
reality and it’s all about the narrative
ran what’s important to the story then
yeah all right I like it we our time
here is done
I wish maybe we should schedule at some
point like if the whole hour just asking
questions because I feel like we got a
lot of questions that we didn’t get to
so I apologize to you guys it’s mostly
my fault I’m you know it just I’m gonna
blame myself well I’m waiting for Bose I
talk too much even though I’m the one
who still I should know that ahead of
time going in but no thank you guys so
much for all of your questions again I
thought even just now you guys are
talking about with different tips that
you use in the thing which I think is
fantastic and I love the community
that’s around dungeon mastering now so
Thank You Jeremy we’ll be back in a
couple of weeks maybe with some more
sage advice No awesome right thanks
everyone we’re gonna take a little break. https://t.co/CH5Df8qYqw pic.twitter.com/5h3QBW1AiO

— Greg Tito (@Gregtito) August 28, 2017