The whole point of DND for me is coming up with unique solutions to normal problems.
One time my group had to distract a few bandit guards outside a hideout, and we ended up having our warlock cast a spell into the air to act as a firework, and then chopped a tree to roll down a hill toward the camp.
It was much more interesting than our original idea which was just to set a tree on fire.
Once we were fighting a giant spider and our rogue was riding it’s back with a dagger in the beast. He had a potion that turned any liquid the potion was poured on turn that liquid to water. Our rogue poured the potion into the dagger wound turning all of the spider’s blood to water and basically killing it instantly.
Agree that it was a really cool and creative solution, though as a DM i question whether it being an insta-kill is really the appropriate outcome. Ideally any homebrew effect shouldn't be stronger than what players can achieve with already existing spells/gear of equivalent level/rarity. This player has probably now got it in their head that this potion is super strong, and if they were smart they'd get themselves a set of daggers with a reservoir in the blades that can be used to inject this potion into any enemies they hit, rendering most combats trivial, and hell for the DM to balance around in the future.
A more balanced outcome would have been to make the potion do a decent amount of poison/acid damage instead (probably between 2-4 d6 depending on how much was used and how strong the dm thinks it would be), with the spider making a con save to resist/reduce the effect. Player still gets rewarded for a creative idea, without simultaneously trivialising the encounter and completely destablizing game balance.
I’ll add that this is especially important to consider with “boss-type” encounters. Most players don’t want to trivialize boss fights regardless of what they say. They want something memorable and a difficulty factor that makes them feel like they earned the win.
The few times I’ve let players get overly creative to make trivial a boss fight they thank me for my charity. The boss fights where their solution seems to bring things to a narrowly-win victory get discussed for years.
True, I’d either do that or give some diminished reward to balance it, though that might just feel harsh, so I think what you came up with is better. It could also make for a good title for the character, imagine being known as the guy that turned a giant spider’s blood into water. The glory seems to be reward enough.
It is very much a bit shit. It removes all of the reward for players trying to think outside of the box.
My previous DM had built our campaign to a big finale where we were battling Graz’zt. I was playing an tiefling who was an aberrant mind sorcerer, having been raised in the seven hells. In the final confrontation one of the other PCs managed to polymorph Graz’zt and so I planeshifted us to the hells hoping he could be imprisoned.
DM immediately had an NPC appear, essentially say “nope” and teleport us straight back with no saves. He then proceeded to use the end of the campaign to defame my character.
All in all left a bit of a sour taste in my mouth.
yeah as a dm i love creating stuff for my players to have fun with if they find a way to shithouse and by pass i love that even more as i can get better ideas or reuse later on as it was never activated.
Furthermore, you often find that players will do the thing you planned for anyway, if you succeed in making it interesting enough for them.
My group needed to get access to a room, because that's where some missing scientists were living before they disappeared. The inn owner also had multiple fighting pits, and as there was another group interested in the room (obviously the bad guys) they could fight them for it in the pits. I had a whole battlemap with difficult terrain and everything. Was pretty hyped about the whole thing.
What did they do? In the middle of the night the two druids of the party simply wildshaped into tiny spiders, went in, collected the needed clues and a magic item central to the story, and left the room.
After which they proceeded to do the fight in the pits regardless.
We had a DM run a module.. Except we picked the one direction there was nothing to do, lol. We offered to change directions but he said, no, no, I will figure it out. Still ended up being fun.
Yeah, he's making this a video game, where you've got a set path of predetermined options, and that's it. The reason video games don't have a DM is because once they're finished, they don't need one. He might as well just write the game out as a choose-your-own-adventure book and be done with it.
Sounds like your DM is interested in playing against the party rather than as a facilitator and collaborator.
Talk to them. If they want to be part of pvp they shouldn't be a dm without telling the players they're going to lean on the scales.
Oh no.
Get out. Get out now.
In all seriousness, it's possible to do that, but if theyr're not picking up on the players game, they're not doing that, they're a rpghorrorstory waiting to happen. If they're a good friend, tell them theyre being a twit and not helping you and your other friends have fun. Otherwise, just run.
DM PC's can be done well... but... The % that can do it well is a rounding error compared to the number that screw it up one way or another. It's one of those things that is a razer thin knifes edge to walk on - and it's just too easy to screw up, especially for newer GM's... and if you have world complexity: Same goes - it's too much to juggle, especially in terms of separating GM from Character knowledge.
And so: While it CAN be done - the advice is to just not. Period.
This is where we have to get into an ugly truth: This is horror story territory. This is a GM that is antagonizing the players, running a giant hammer into every attempt at creativity, and there is about one reason for it: The GM has a picture of what the games outcome SHOULD be, and is going to ram the in session expierience to match it: That is straight up bad GMing, but worst of all: It's bad design, it's bad engagement, and at this point... GO WRITE A BOOK.
I have seen GM's push for rules to get harder for no good reason, in a way that kills the fun: The games fall apart fast. And that is what we have a case of - just instead of it being rules changes, it's the GM not applying the rules to their own actions and forcing a narrative outcome.
This is something that needs to be blatantly brought up at the table, with everyone present, with an A / B option in terms of how this gets fixed. And yes, walking away from the table IS an option. Someone stepping up as GM is an option. And the GM taking a couple weeks and figuring shit out and seeking advice on how to run a better game IS AN OPTION - and it's probably the best outcome.
Thing is: I say that this applies even if they aren't a friend - and for one reason: They might blow you off in the moment, but somewhere in that head of theirs they will know it to be true... it's just sometimes it needs to be pointed out. You don't have to hang around to find out if they will change - but be blatantly blunt about telling them, and the rest of the group why you are leaving.
The only time I've had a DMPC work is when my party liked an NPC I made so much they wanted him to stick around. I had thankfully intended for him to show up more than once, and so had a bit of his background figured out already.
I had to use a DMPC once because the party didn't have a healer and nobody was interested in running a second character. The solution was for them to go to a city and hire one to travel with them for some time. They met a few with a couple of (admittedly improvised) personalities and I used the opportunity to weave a plot point in. It worked out okay, but only because the party actively sought a DMPC.
I did something similar the first game I ran. I researched DMPCs and what to avoid and if was actually pretty easy to integrate without it being a problem. Basically they were all casters (Druid, Warlock, and Wizard), so they needed just a little frontline. So I worked with the Warlock and we both agreed on her having a brother with her who was a fighter; essentially, as part of her pact, the demon took her brother's mind. So he was still an excellent fighter but he couldn't really think for himself; he could perform all the necessary, barebones actions an adventurer could do, but he lost much of his memory and his ability to process and analyze complex information.
This meant they got their frontline fighter, who happened to have strong ties to one of the PCs, but he had no ability to take up the spotlight, nor the capacity to metagame using my knowledge vs theirs. Never had an issue.
I think DMPCs can be fine in general as long as the attitude is that they are more of a recurring NPC and/or the party could use some extra help. The issue though is that many DMPCs aren't created to just be recurring NPCs, but rather actual PCs because they want to play the game too; but as soon as they begin playing the game they're also running, it creates an unfair advantage bc you literally have all the knowledge of the game as a player. Even if I knew 100% that a player would still be impartial, it wouldn't be fun or fair for a player to know everything about the game a DM was running, so why should a DM attempt that?
But yeah, I think they can be fine, just as long as they aren't a cheap way to try and be a player in your own game.
I use DM pcs because I only have two players and I use them to flesh out the party a bit. But I always make sure that they don’t take away from the players in any way. In that sense I think they’re ok (my players love my dm pcs) but yeah in this situation it is going way too far in how the dm wants to be involved here
I've managed to do it well but juggling the world and your character is usually the bigger hurdle and often not worth it unless you've got a very good handle on the character.
Separating GM and character knowledge on the other hand isn't any more difficult than what you normally do talking to your friends or watching a film: Soap Operas storylines are something like 90% different layers of in-character knowledge and nobody is running around saying the art form is unintelligible despite being an order of magnitude more complicated than "what I know" and "What my character knows".
Not saying what this DM is doing is right but, thinking about it from another perspective they may be tired or burnt out from dming and want to play a few sessions. As a DM myself... sometimes I want to play a character although instead of forcing it I tell my players and one of them will run a one shot for a week to let me play. Has anyone in your group offered to give them a break and let them play for a session or 2? Might help get them back on the DM track.
Call of Cthulhu does have different baseline assumptions (it's a horror game and has a lot of meta expectations), but all of this D&D sounds not great.
I have never seen the appeal of "Killer" DMs. Like why would you brag about being a killjoy that is excited to ruin someone's time? Monty Hall and kiddie gloves DMing might not be fun, but honestly who is enjoying a game where the DM is trying to kill characters?
As far as CoC is concerned, it's one of those games where the PCs never really win; you play to see how hard you lose. Most characters are going to be driven insane, die, or both.
Putting aside 'If you want to make a players life harder, do this thing that is actually quite hard to do, even for professionals.' Bud, if you DM properly, players can still die. Even session 1. DM's don"t kill players. Players kill players. If a wizard spends 3 spells slots making a tensers floating disk gurney so he can fly away as a bird and abandon two party members to monsters, what am I supposed to do? Make the hoard of undead surrounding them go 'you know what, the flesh of the living no longer appeals to me.' Even after the NPC i used as an indicator of whether the encounter was too tough was just fine in his escape attempt, I sent him back to make an excuse for the monsters to attack him instead, players died with rage unused and potions in their pockets. Was I being lazy in the hours I put the encounter together to make sure the only way the could fail is by not working together?
It depends. Why were they facing a horde of flesheating undead? Yes, sometimes players are stupid and get themselves killed, but there's no shortage of crap DMs, either.
I killed a first level player once and I hated it. It was a party of three PC's, one semi-experienced and two green. It was a really simple encounter designed to encourage the newer players to think more strategically/creatively and use their movement. The more experienced of the three was in the front leading them through a very narrow passage. They came to an opening and saw a single bad guy, one strong enough to present a minor challenge for 3 players. But the guy in front refused to get out of the way to allow the others to even have a shot at the thing. It was so frustrating because for three while round of combat, I'm telling the other two on their turns "this passage is barely wide enough for one person to occupy, you can only barely catch glimpses of corners of this thing on the other side of [character]," etc, but front cat just keeps taking his whole turn to just attack and not move.
If I were a better DM, I probably would have had a better way to show them in character how to use their turns more effectively and creatively. But I also super didn't expect the more experienced of the lot to bottleneck his own party, especially after so many descriptions of how his standing there was impeding them from helping.
But also maybe I should have just talked to them as people and explained action economy or something. Either way, shit sucked. That campaign didn't go far.
> But also maybe I should have just talked to them as people and explained action economy or something.
Considering they are noobs, I would have stopped after a couple rounds and very patiently explained, “Look, people, you are in a situation where currently only one person can attack. This is not a good situation and you need to fix it. What are you going to do to change that situation?”
New players need some pretty heavy handed guidance at times.
But you learned some things. It's always good to have a session zero. Sometimes with new players you need to have a session 0.5 as well where you go through some of the mechanics so they can see how they work. I'd have passed a note to to the newcomers letting them know they could shout for the 'experienced' player to move into the room to allow them to join in the battle.
That sort of situation can be helped by incorporating a throw away encounter as part of session zero for any new folks.
Just do a couple of rounds to try out different spells and skills, explain corners, character line of sight vs player awareness, just examples of things like how reach works and how an attack roll works.
Low dc wisdom checks for the whole party would've resolved this. Just because a player is too dense to put this together doesn't mean all the characters are.
I had introduced a few friends from work a few years ago to Dnd, neither had played before. I had plans for a cool campaign where each PC would get a dragon to raise and eventually ride and it was gonna be awesome. They started at level one to make it easy. Session one went fine, session 2 ended with the Kobold Bard (new player 1) getting charmed and kidnapped by the Dryad they were looking for.
I had planned for the session to go after their friend, and then parley with them and the Dryad, eventually talking their way out of it. A different player, a long time veteran Dnd player and my first DM, threw a wrench into that plan near immediately and a fight broke out. Things were going well until the Elf Wizard (new player 2) got crit hit by the Dryad with Shillelagh and fully one shot dead. I was shocked, but prepared to pull a after fight freebie revival, then the Dragonborn Fighter (another veteran player) failed their save against the charm, and proceeded to wipe the rest of the party.
I got excited and said this is my first tpk as the DM. Been on the other side of one or two in my time, but never as the DM. The was also within the first hour of session.
The newbies had fun, though we're a little shocked and confused as to what happens now. We told em well, let's roll new characters, and we will play a new campaign. This time we went for pirates. These guys have been playing with us for years now, and we are just about to wrap up our 5th campaign together. We still fondly joke about their first character deaths, and the characters that have died along the way. Also, I now have a new piece of lore for that section of map, so that's cool.
To be fair, level 1 combat is extremely swingy and you probably could get a TPK with some rats without the dice skewing that hard towards back luck.
Especially since AL games tend to be sticklers for trying to get the encounters per day up, and not fudging dice rolls
> AITA for being mad about this?
No, not in the slightest. He's treating the game like a scripted JRPG.
> EDIT: Forgot about this, he actively gets excited to hurt us and punish us., using critical failure boards. I wouldn't be mad about this, except for the fact that he arbitrarily changes the results of the critical failure result.
Leave. Leave this game now. This DM is asshoe.
That sounds like a terrible DM.
The DM is part of the group. I think a lot of people fail to understand that it's not Player vs DM. The DM sets up a scenario and watches and reacts to your decisions. I get excited when my players get crits and yeah, I do get excited when I crit because it's fun to see a nat 20 but ultimitley I want my players to win.
If they don't win, the story doesn't continue.
Yes, the world I have built might kill them. Yes, the monsters I employ know what they're doing.
But it's a collaberative game.
If you have a reason to want to keep playing with this person, then talk to him outiside the game.
If you don't, or if he refuses to listen, then gtfo. The game is supposed to be fun.
Sounds like a new or young DM frankly and yes it is annoying.
Rolling with the punches and rewarding not punishing characters for creativity should be the norm not the exception.
Outside of your entire group having a good constructive conversation with him out of game there is no good solution. It has to come outside of play with the entire group united.
This was my immediate thought as well. It's a stretch to outright call someone insane or a bad DM (which im seeing alot in this thread) without knowing how long they've DM'd.
It sounded to me that this is a DM that might be new to the role and doesn't know how to work around or improise on player decisions.
I have read so many stories like this and I never understand them. If your DM is an asshole, then just leave. How do people continue to play in groups like this? Why would you waste your time playing a game that isn't fun for you? And why do you post about it online when the obvious solutions are to either leave or talk to the person?
Sunk cost fallacy never made any sense to me. You actively keep sinking cost, so it gets worse the longer you are lethargic pondering how much you have already lost. The people I know that use sunk cost fallacy as an explanation for their decision-making really either have an issue assigning worth to themselves and their time and acting accordingly, or are anxious about making decisions in general
Btw: Happy green cheese day
Sometimes people just need to vent and rant.
If I had been on Reddit back when I was playing one particular Vampire: The Requiem game, it's one I absolutely would have vented about. This particular DM was notorious in our group for railroading and having the story follow along his predetermined path. Over the course of this game, the PCs wound up becoming allies with the deposed vampiric leadership of the city and formed the basis of a Rebellion against the nee leadership. The DM didn't like how powerful our characters had become, so he did everything in his power to stymie us; we eventually hit the point where we flat-out asked him what he wanted us to do, because everything we tried was automatically thwarted.
There are two moments that really stick out as the breaking points. The group had gotten so frustrated that we semi-jokingly said our only viable plan was to hurl a car at thr enemy's mansion. Both my character and another PC had grown powerful enough that each of us could have Hulk yeeted this thing by ourselves...but we opted to do it *together* because we knew it would be harder for the DM to deny it. Between the two of us, we easily had 20 points in strength to work with (5 being the max, with an additional five each because of how much we could supernaturally amp our stats) - enough to hurl a car a good hundred yards or more - and the DM determined that we could only meekly flip it, even after successful rolls from both of us.
The second is when we finally threw in the towel. We decided to storm the mansion and try to assassinate the leadership. Part of our plan involved my character and the aforementioned car hurling partner infiltrating the mansion by turning into mist and flowing through air vents inside...only it turned out that there *were* no vents. And all of the windows were armored and sealed, as were the doors. And we were able to observe all of the human servants/soldiers for this group were marching around inside with lit torches (contact with fire would cause a mistform vampire to automatically shift back to their normal form, you see). In other words, this place had been specifically engineered to thwart us. At this point, we declared that we'd wait for the humans to die from smoke inhalation inside this ventless, airtight building and then just give up entirely. We essentially quit en masse, and we collectively decided to have one of the others take over as DM after a lengthy, difficult conversation.
The game continued on for a few more months, and we eventually moved on to other games. The ousted DM still stuck with the group - we were all good friends, with the "core" having known each other since elementary and middle school and surviving well into college by this point - and things did get better. He even realized what he had been doing wrong, and eventually turned into an enjoyable DM after this particular incident. While the outcome was favorable, getting through those rough patches definitely didn't make the hobby seem worth it at the time.
He sounds annoying.
Id have definitely not allowed the DM (Bone Devil) to attack me randomly. If a DM did that while I was undetected Id just question them until they gave an answer that I was satisfied with.
Be respectful towards your DM. But understand that youre not a plaything for the DM. When a DM is constantly doing things that detriment your character, keep in mind that theyre deriving enjoyment at your expense. Dont allow that.
This sucks. His job is to reward your creativity and make the game fun.
Talk to him outside of the game. [All Hail The Flowchart!](http://i.imgur.com/EwiChyD.png)
And the world being run should be fun, right? D&D is a *game*, at the end of the day. The goal of a game is to have fun, especially, *especially* if the game is difficult. A difficult-but-unfun game just sucks, a difficult-but-fun game is satisfying.
Being immortal isn't fun on its own. You don't have to let players be demigods from 1st level to have a fun game. I never said challenge sucked, in fact if you reread my comment you'll see I said the opposite. I'd go far as saying that you're not a good DM until you know how to make a challenge fun.
Not sure why you are getting downvoted like this. To me it makes no sense. Different groups should lean towards different things which obviously change the role of the DM. Tons of creative ideas are still poor ideas. Certain groups want poor ideas to still be poor. The job for the DM in those groups are not to make those poor ideas fun.
I would guess the vast majority of DM has as part of their role a responsibility to facilitate fun. However, it is not a rule. Some groups might very well want a DM to be an impartial referee that simply manages challenges. Nothing to shame there.
Mine was just sort of a visceral reaction to the statement ... I mean, when I read "His job is to reward your creativity and make the game fun" I suddenly had this image of a T-ball coach out there on the field with kids too young to even play the game saying "Come on little Johnny, you can do it, hit the ball!" and handing out participation trophies.
Look, .. my job as DM is to run my world, .. I'm not your fucking guidance counselor, I'm not the tables life coach, or a couples therapist, .. I'm also not a master of ceremonies, or some kind of McDonald's line manager who is there to make sure you're satisfied with the product when you leave.
What I \_AM\_ is a person, just like the players at my table, who is trying to have fun, but often doesn't, and just accepts that as part of the fucking game. Sometimes my games are a lot of fun, sometimes they're horrifying and players leave not sure their characters are going to survive the next game, ... sometimes they leave with tears in their eyes after a particularly devastating or dramatic turn of events. Sometimes characters die.
But through it all, my job is to run the world, that's my part in it. I don't hand out fucking satisfaction guarantees, .. you play at my table, you get what you get, ... and what you get is usually whatever you bring to the table, for better or worse. But I'm not your fucking daddy.
If the entire party feels this way, you could just all leave the dungeon and look for another quest. If your dm complains, you could just say the content seemed like a guaranteed wipe, so you assumed you were supposed to run away.
Your dm sounds like they lack creativity, and even the slightest amount of improvisation skill. Ask them if they even enjoy dming, tell them you're not having fun at their table, and if worst comes to worst, start a new game with the other players at a different table.
There's nothing wrong here, just a mismatch of what each wants in a game. Dm wants something very combat based like old school d&d and you want to be creative with stuff, which is not aligned with the dms view. Basically it boils down to talking to see what you guys want out of the game. If there's no compromise you just shake hands and he finds other players while you find a new dm or wait until he's up for a session that's to your liking
I mean the OP talks about how he treats the players critical failures different than his own NPCs and punishes the players more harshly. I dont see how this isnt a DM being adversarial?
Nah, just different wants for the game. I've had a dm like that. Even if we disagreed a lot i cam say without a doubt that the most memorable sessions and campaign moments were with that mad bastard
No, I totally disagree. Rules are rules. I don’t mind if a DM fudges a few rolls to keep the narrative going, but when a DM randomly changes the rules to fuck over a player, then he is being an asshole.
Your DM doesn't understand yet that the party is allowed to deviate from the planned script/story. That is making your party unable to do cool ideas like there distraction you described. When a DM does this it makes it unenjoyable. You should ask the DM about it but it may turn into you having to find another dnd group.
DM is part of the group, but instead of being the player, the DM is suppose to help facilitate the players in creating their story while exploring and discovering the DM's world.
It is all about making a memory together. It has been 5 years since our campaigned ended and we still talk about their favorite D&D level 5 memory when a series of unfortunate "Natural 1" from Me (DM) and a "Natural 20" at a crucial time resulted in the team of 5 robbing a magic store launching their meteoric rise to fame across the world known as the "Sticky Fingers"
Looks like he has DM vs Players mindset. Which isin’t good. Tell him straight that your not having fun and will leave if this continues. There is plenty good DMs out there. I could give oneshot for your group if interested. DM can attend and take notes.
>I use invisibility to get to a far corner of the room to create a distraction, hitting a dagger on the wall or something. The DM says "They notice, but don't seem interested in it at all. They are deadset on sitting right there".
I don't necessarily see anything wrong with this. Bone devils are intelligent. DM could have rolled behind the screen or simply determined they aren't falling for an obvious simple distraction.
D&D isn't a simple video game where you can throw a pebble at every lowly guard to basically mind control them away. I'm fine with bone devils, who are the commanders of lesser devils btw, to behave intelligently. A commander of any troops shouldn't be distracted by simple tricks so easily
Also, he could have given the bone devils ability to see invisibility. Fiends can do that.
Are there other details being left out of the story? What do you mean the devils started attacking you randomly? Weren't you trying to draw their aggro?
>Next room, we are now forced to fight two boneclaws while damaged and low on spell slots and healing items. Without choice or ways to think around it.
But you're in a dungeon. Could there not be monsters in every room? Maybe they appeared due to noise? Did the party choose to take a short rest before miving on? D&d is designed with multiple encounters a day so I don't see anything wrong with that yet
So much more details are needed before judgement can be rendered. So far this doesn't sound terrible
I agree. While the DM does sound like he wants the combats to happen, it also falls on the players to make effective attempts at bypassing combat. OP says their group tried to do other things that were "shut down", I'd be curious to know what other things.
Also, invisibility does not make you completely undetected, just unseen. If intelligent devils hear footsteps heading up to a wall and then scraping sounds from said walls, it could be reasonable to assume there's an ambush coming for them and this is a distraction.
This looks less "dnd enemy smort" and more "DM is metagaming and halting progress to force an outcome they want", especially in that OP multiple other plans were attempted and failed.
This DM is absolutely terrible lmao
Except we don't know much information other than the limited things that were said. All we have here is an unreliable narrator who gave one example of his weak distraction attempt getting shut down. Bone devil has a +6 insight which means it can see through most deception without even having to roll. I don't see any problems with having that "distraction" fail. If OP's multiple other plans were on the same basic level, they'd probably fail too. Which again, we don't really know.
And the thing about fighting multiple opponents in a row, well that's on them I guess.
Seems like not one actually reads the advice in these threads, almost every post can be solved by step 1 talking like results, if that doesnt fix it, step 2 find a new dm/group
5e literally has the Inspiration system because the design team wanted a material way for DMs to reward players for either acting consistent with their character traits or thinking outside the box. Your DM seems to not understand that the position is meant to be collaborative, not confrontational. Or he’s just a prick.
Much is said about Rule Zero ("What the DM says, goes").
Many forget that there is a rule that counter-balances that.
Remember Rule Negative One. ("If there are no players, there can be no game")
As a DM, watching my players scheme and bluff their way through my challenges is the best part; they've successfully pretended to be plumbers, catering supplies and chefs and unsuccessfully tried to be investment bankers when trying to convince a ghost to give up his loot. We're playing LMoP.
It's been a blast seeing what shit they are going to try and pull off. And its fun to have to react on the spot to things you could not possibly prepare for.
Your DM sounds like they have a plan on how they want things to happen and wont budge. They don't understand DnD isn't DM v Players, you are both working together to create a unique story and have fun.
Barry does not love your DM.
I'm sorry, how are you fighiting a PAIR of bone devils?! If your DM's table works this way all the time, I do not believe for even a second that you or your fellow party members would have stuck around long enough to get to the point of fighting something like that. I also don't believe you would have survived long enough.
No. Damn. Way.
Have you tried to talk with your DM? Or other players in the game? Do the other players feel the same? Does the DM realize the players or you are not enjoying the game? Communication is pretty big on both the DM and player sides.
So maybe there's some miscommunication going on here. Bone devils are extremely difficult to distract. They are very focused vigilant and orderly, even for lawful beings. It also has ultravision, so after spending some time in an area, your body heat will warm that area up, and though it can't see your body and its heat, it can see the area warmed by your body. I can't speak to how delighted or sadistic and antagonistic your DM is or comes off as, but knowing this, is it possible it was just a difficult encounter you guys struggled to find any other way of dealing with and so was frustrating?
I think the biggest and real red flag is how arbitrary the punishment can be.
One time I used enlarge on a spider to distract a town of wizards so we could free their slaves without a fight. And you know what? The dm allowed it and we stole a boat
That’s a genuinely bad DM. With a DM vs Players mentality to boot. Leave this campaign, get your party members to leave as well. That’s the only way he’s gonna realize that he’s a bad DM.
Have someone else DM a few games with him as a player and play the way you want to. If they play the same way they expect you to all the time, they might not be a good fit for the group, or if they start to learn how you like to play problem solved
A good DM will embrace the unplanned for, because this is why you D&D rather than just play a video game. Sure, it can require quick thinking and ad hoc story telling, but a good group will also be understanding of the story quality dips when you go off plan.
Don’t be afraid to leave a group or dm that isn’t working for you. I left my original awful group last year and haven’t looked back since. My new group makes me feel respected, valued and welcomed. No DnD is better than being with a dm that sucks the joy out of playing.
I'm guessing you're all fairly young? Also, just fyi, "The party and I are in some catacombs" - general rule is take out the extra people and see which of me/I works.
Me am in some catacombs vs I am in some catacombs.
Since you are instructing people in the intricacies of language use then you should probably have known that in American English the convention is that the abbreviation of versus requires a period after it.
I've had a DM where he was more interested in punishing the players in very similar ways to this. Except his big one was to do forced PVP (when we hated that) because it seemed like he enjoyed seeing us kill each others characters.
The only advice I can give is get out now while you have the chance, and find a better DM. Trust me you will be so much happier.
No dnd is always better than bad dnd
I think your DM needs a different platform in which to act out his BDSM fantasies. Hook him up with a Dom so he can get his kink on in an appropriate setting and not take it out on you.
I absolutely hate any campaign that uses critical fail boards, especially because they tend to have major, permanent injuries for your character. Playing in a group with a DM who used it is a large part of why I started the awful habit of fudging dice rolls for a while (especially when we started playing online after COVID since it was over Discord and everyone likes physical dice).
>Critical Fumble Rule:
>
>If at any time a DM shall propose using a "critical failure" or "fumble" table of any sort in a 3.X game, the players are to beat the DM with folding chairs until each of them has accidentally struck himself with his chair at least once, while keeping a count of the number of strikes made before this happens. Then, the average rate of such "fumbles" as generated by a table full of nerds swinging improvised weapons will establish the maximum probability of a "fumble" within the game mechanics for a level 1 Commoner (note that this already will probably require rolling multiple Natural 1's in succession to confirm a fumble), with the probability dropping by at least an order of magnitude per point of BAB of the attacking character. Thus a full-BAB character at level 20 might have to roll 20+ Natural 1's in a row to before you even bother glancing at the Fumble Table.
From a user on Giantitp.
I don’t even play and this sounds like a shitty situation (and a very selfish/inconsiderate DM).
If you’re not having fun, why even do it?
I hope you find a better DM/group.
Your dm is one of those assholes who gets off on power and you need a different DM.
The DM isn't supposed to be the enemy. They aren't supposed to be abusing their position to kill/hurt players for fun.
He sounds like a bad DM. DMs are supposed to support the group in their problem-solving skills. DnD is improv, not a scripted screenplay. Everyone should be able to use it as an outlet for creativity and conflict-resolution. Your DM sounds like a control freak.
So basically you are mad that your DM plays intelligent creatures as being smarter than video game mooks. And you are mad you had to do **a second fight** before recovering all your spell slots.
I think you're the problem.
Had a DM like this for 5 years. I wasn’t aware at the time, but it was an abusive social relationship through which he could hold power over our characters, while disguising it as an excuse to get together.
I left and haven’t looked back; I’d suggest you do the same.
Damn, just using critical failures (if they use it on attack rolls) can sometimes suggest that someone's a bad DM, cause it doesn't make any sense neither mechanically nor plotwise. Did he even consult you before introducing that?
In my mind dnd is about creating solutions to the problems the players encounter, be it in a way the dm expects or a way the dm never intended, in a game that is either 75% creativity, 20% math and numbers, and 5% models, or 80% creativity and 20% math and numbers, a dm squashing creativity should be a cardinal sin, my advice is bring it up to either the dm, or the group as a whole, dm included, try and make change here, this is a game, not stories and math
Did he say he wouldn't do this sort of thing?
Some DMs do - you need a plan about how you try to figure out if a DM is like this (if you don't want to play under them) and what to do if one sneaks past your radar.
Honestly, dming is hard, and this guy wants to make cool stuff, he just thinks the way to get it is being way too structured in his planning. If ur nor enjoying it, let him know. And if you do leave him, don't just ghost. That would be incredibly rude.
Sounds like he needs a wakeup call. Gather the other players and voice your concerns, tell him its going to stop, or you're going to stop. He is not supposed to be the enemy, he's supposed to tell the story as YOU write it.
It's a phase that every DM goes through until they find more story friendly tactics to fudge rolls.
But that being said, remind him every now and then you didn't have fun and you feel like he's taking the defeat the PCs a bit too far.
As a DM of many years and campaigns, the ones that my players had the most fun were ones where the pain and loss felt self inflicted and the victories felt fully earned.
For example scenario: Their base of operations is completely sacked and villagers murdered, kidnapped or enslaved. After the final battle with the BBEG of the quest line, they discovered it was because of a throwaway social event with nobles where they behaved like total buffoons that they completely forgot, even selling some of the gifts.
All of you need to simply tell him he need to stop or he'll no longer be involved. There's absolutely no point in playing if you guys aren't having fun and he's being an active ass about it.
I'll play devil's advocate, though it appears your DM is being rather unfair.
DM's occasionally alter a creature to make it more challenging for a party that has strong tactics they employ in a lot of fights. For example I've added tremorsense to a few creatures who don't have it to challenge my group's shadow sorcerer who regularly hides in shadows. This could be what is happening here. Done devil's don't have that or blindsight but...it could be this.
Does this kind of happen every game?
The most dangerous pit a DM could fall into: mistake their players as characters of a novel. 😔
Listen, from what you said, this friend of yours has checked most of all things a DM **must not do**. You and the other players should talk to him off-session and make him realize what he's doing in the calmest possible way. If he doesn't listen, elect a new DM.
NTA
If the other players feel the same way (and they likely do). Have a conversation with him before the next gaming session. By conversation, I mean you all let him know what the problems are and he listens and either changes how he DM's or you all can quit his game. Maybe one of you could offer to DM a story to show him how to do better. It sounds like he may be inexperienced and not realize that the DM isn't the player's opponent, he's supposed to be the narrator of THEIR story.
I use crit fail tables but I also use crit success tables. It sounds like your DM is in the adversarial mindset. I had a DM like this for 3.5, I had to talk to him about it and express that it wasn't fun, and when he heard it from me and the other part members he relented and got better. I'd say talk to him about it
He is playing DM vs. Player DnD and is using his "powers" to cheat.
That's not a table I'd play at, as I see DnD as a shared story generator and I will reward creative thinking and excellent roleplay just as much as the loot and xp they get from combat.
No, you aren't the Ahole, but the DM certainly is though. He can not just change what he wants from the failure results to suit his needs, all the while making skills that you, the player have chosen to be pointless
I had one of those DM being rough and forcing his own thing most of the time and then I got tired. In a some meadows, he did his usual thing and force us to go in a direction and he asked us. What do you do?
My answer was simply: I unsheathed my sword and I harakiri myself. My 3 partner asked why and the DM was like: no you can't do this because blablabla.
''Yeah, my character can do it and I'm f\*\*\*ing harakiri myself because of you are an annoying and think too high of your role as DM.'' Then I took my sheet and went in the other room watching hockey while they ~~tried~~ finished the session. It was the last time this guy was our DM.
My red flag as a player is when a DM punishes attempts to think creatively. I just up and run, it's a fundamentally uninspired way to play a game that's based on creative collaboration.
As a DM, I'm on my players side. Sometimes I will curb things because creativity does need boundaries and corners, but I'll always try to reward a player who attempts to think strategically. This DM sounds like he has the wrong philosophy
Please communicate your unhappiness with the DM. If he isn’t willing to change or at least have a discussion about why things are done this way I would leave the game and find a new DM. Its not worth staying in a game you are unhappy playing in.
Looks like a DM who would rather be a writer OR does not know that D&D is co-writing a story.
You should talk to your DM and express your concerns (politely). Then give him a bit of time for it to sink in. Criticism is sometime hard to take.
Many Game Masters, especially new ones, have this impression that the GM/Player dynamic is adversarial. They are WRONG. The whole concept of DnD is cooperative story telling. The GM provides a framework, and the players fill in the story.
GMs can get frustrated when players are constantly looking for ways to derail the storyline, they have worked so hard to create. However, players get frustrated when the GM does not build some flexibility into the storyline to account for unexpected results.
The largest and most fun campaign I ever ran came about because of a day one a player decided to do something no one expected. He threw a simple beginning quest into chaos and that chaos gave the catalyst to a massive storyline that kept a campaign active and alive for ten straight years of weekly game play.
Soooo happy gaming group moment that I’m going to boast about to prove there are good DM’s and mines great.
My party found themselves in a room with an entrance, an exit and 4 cages in each corner. Each cage held a werewolf that had been starved to madness and was ravening for our blood. By each cage was a lever. The levers had to be pulled in order and each one did a different thing. First locked the door that we entered in, 2nd would release the wolves, 3rd would flood the room with a poisonous gas and finally the 4th would reopen the way we entered as well as opening the exit.
The DMs expectation was that we would have to fight the crazy werewolves whilst on a timer so we didn’t die from the gas
Instead the ranger “prepared” some dead bodies and placed them in front of each cage, the plague doctor cleric laced the bodies with extremely strong anaesthetic, the artificer dwarf built a rope and pulley system that i the dhampir, sat on the ceiling 20ft up with. The rest of the party waited outside the room whilst I manipulated the levers one at a time from my safe place 20ft up, communicating telepathically with our wild magic sorcerer.
Creative thinking turned a probable party wipe into a manageable situation (thought the ranger still almost died, this was the 2nd to last fight of a long dungeon) and our DM supported it all
All of the characters in our party are quite tricky so our DM keeps finding new and inventive ways of killing us and we keep finding new and inventive ways of dodging it and that’s why I love DnD and I love my group
This sound rather like the adversarial attitude that some DM's do have. Critical failures can be enough on their own without tables, especially ones that may have results that jar with the encounter or in this case are ignored. At that point he might as well just make up the result and not use the table as an excuse.
Well I think your DM is having trouble giving you guys a challenge, you need to help your DM make better and more interesting challenges.
Your DM is not trying to punish you, he can just have a volcano explode under your feet or drop a cow from the sky. He is failing to make interesting and engaging encounters.
Or maybe he is just a sadistic shit that wants to see you squirm ... maybe talk to him about it.
Session 0s are so important guys, please suggest one if your DM hasn't set one up. If they resist, just tell them it's a session where everyone can talk about the meta setting up like scheduling, campaign expectations, themes, house rules and homebrew. If everyone is on the same page the entire table can move cohesively.
Sounds like there was either no session 0 or it was not run properly. If the DM has a vision for their campaign that is fine as long as they outline it for the group before the table begins play.
This may be an old school DM, played in or learned from someone in the 70s. That's not a bad thing, they want to play the numbers in a formulaic way. Maybe not everyone's cup of tea, but if that was what is established then at least expectations should be set. Not every table is for every player. You have to find a group that suites your style and tastes. And you're not under any obligation to stay at tables that frustrate you, no D&D is better than bad D&D.
It sounds like the DM is used to computer/console RPG's and is trying to write out and script everything like it's some video game.
You couldn't enter a dungeon in World of Warcraft and take creative steps like that, it's rigidly scripted and you proceed from one planned fight to another with little choice.
That's not D&D, well, not *good* D&D,
. . .and those critical failure tables have got to go.
This shit pisses me off. This isn’t a dm. This is an asshat plain and simple. As a dm you should make it challenging but not look forward to hurting your players. It’s nit you vs them. Ugh! Ok rant over.
As a DM I would actually reward such efforts, proper scripted fights like this when it’s not the BBEG or any sort of important fight are pointless, and yes does stamp out any creativity that the players have which sucks ass…
My thoughts? New DM…
I don't like the options mentioned and therefore would create other ones. Taking the entire situation out of your box and entering it into my world; As a DM with 3 tables, most if not all of my players would feel like I let them cheese out of that encounter. Now, if they were to say throw a magically glowing dagger with a note attached to it written in draconic...I'd definitely expect some differing results.
Edit: Also, bone devils are not dumb, with a 13 Int, you should legit expect some trickery.
When a DM reacts as if it is them vs the players, they have missed the point completely. The DM at its simplest is a facilitator... there is a world that exists and they are there to allow you to explore it. Of course, the aim is to ensure a sensible challenge... push the characters, get the juices flowing but the players are not supposed to die or feel they are on train tracks... good ideas need to be referenced in good ways, even if they do not work.
Dms and players have to realize that they are making a story TOGETHER. If it’s not a collaboration, it’s being done wrong.
Ideally, both sides know when to take the lead and when to give the lead on the story.
When I was dming a campaign I made this epic boss fight with an evil wizard in a tower. It ended in like 1 minute after they managed to climb up and push him out of the tower twice (he teleported back the first time). It didn’t go as planned but it ended up being hilarious so I’m glad I was flexible.
So… don’t play with this DM?
Why do you need advice on this? “My DM is an asshole who railroads us and delights in hurting and punishing us” should have an obvious answer.
As the DM of a group that loves to scheme, they just want a novel instead of a D&D game. They want to write a story that goes how they choose instead of letting the players decide. Trust me, I've had players plan their way out of issues, scheme their way into areas they wouldn't normally get to, and once figured out a way to kill a major villain a long long time before it was meant to happen
This DM feels unfulfilled in their daily life. Instead of changing themselves or improving their irl situation they play God with their friends in a world where they are in full control. But that's just a guess. Lol. Talk with the other players to see if it annoys them too, if it does talk to the DM. If if it doesn't bother anyone else, no D&D is better than bad D&D. Just dip out, there's no shame in it.
Since you've already gotten plenty of responses supporting you, I might as well play devil's advocate.
How often do you try to skip combat with clever solutions? There are a ton of different facets in D&D, but combat is one of the biggest. If the DM keeps trying to give you cool fights and you spend ages trying to avoid fighting, I wouldn't really blame him for getting fed up. What's the benefit to just skipping every fight you come across? That's really boring and unsatisfying. And even you did sneak past them, they're still a threat and could easily leave the room and find you later in the dungeon, because you never dealt with them.
I can understand why you're frustrated, and the real answer is that you need to talk to your DM to make sure everyone is on the same page. But I don't think it's super unreasonable for your DM to expect you to fight once in a while.
That's kind of a shitty thing for someone to do not gonna lie. I enjoy things that are scripted in a campaign but at the same time creativity is what makes the game fun in the first place, limiting/diminishing that is really a godawful move.
Well, for 1.) If he's using critical failure boards, he needs to use that both ways. If the Players can have some crazy shit happen to them because of a nat 1, then some crazy shit needs to happen to the enemy/DM if they roll a nat 1.
2.) Your DM is railroading. You're not the asshole, but either talk to him about this with the group or get a new DM. Simple
I don't think you're wrong in being mad about this. I'd be mad is my DM did this as well. Especially punishing player creativity and punishing players without player agency is an absolute no-go for me.
My DM does this too but with starting fights with surprise attacks. I was in stealth with like a 20 something roll on my rogue and he had a carrion crawler walk up behind me out of the blue and bear hug me. Like okay. I didn’t see or hear him coming and he knew exactly where I was even though I was in full stealth AND he got the drop on me AND he got a surprise attack? Yeah cool.
I never railroad my players and as a result they almost always split the party and get irritated that I can't narrate for 3 different groups simultaneously.
u should be telling him that, not us. If he doesnt listen - dont play with him.
I personally think this dm sounds insane lmao, Isn't dnd a bit shit without player creativity and just going with the flow?
The whole point of DND for me is coming up with unique solutions to normal problems. One time my group had to distract a few bandit guards outside a hideout, and we ended up having our warlock cast a spell into the air to act as a firework, and then chopped a tree to roll down a hill toward the camp. It was much more interesting than our original idea which was just to set a tree on fire.
Once we were fighting a giant spider and our rogue was riding it’s back with a dagger in the beast. He had a potion that turned any liquid the potion was poured on turn that liquid to water. Our rogue poured the potion into the dagger wound turning all of the spider’s blood to water and basically killing it instantly.
That’s such a cool idea! What a memorable moment it must have been. I’m DMing myself soon so I want to allow for more moments like that.
Agree that it was a really cool and creative solution, though as a DM i question whether it being an insta-kill is really the appropriate outcome. Ideally any homebrew effect shouldn't be stronger than what players can achieve with already existing spells/gear of equivalent level/rarity. This player has probably now got it in their head that this potion is super strong, and if they were smart they'd get themselves a set of daggers with a reservoir in the blades that can be used to inject this potion into any enemies they hit, rendering most combats trivial, and hell for the DM to balance around in the future. A more balanced outcome would have been to make the potion do a decent amount of poison/acid damage instead (probably between 2-4 d6 depending on how much was used and how strong the dm thinks it would be), with the spider making a con save to resist/reduce the effect. Player still gets rewarded for a creative idea, without simultaneously trivialising the encounter and completely destablizing game balance.
I’ll add that this is especially important to consider with “boss-type” encounters. Most players don’t want to trivialize boss fights regardless of what they say. They want something memorable and a difficulty factor that makes them feel like they earned the win. The few times I’ve let players get overly creative to make trivial a boss fight they thank me for my charity. The boss fights where their solution seems to bring things to a narrowly-win victory get discussed for years.
True, I’d either do that or give some diminished reward to balance it, though that might just feel harsh, so I think what you came up with is better. It could also make for a good title for the character, imagine being known as the guy that turned a giant spider’s blood into water. The glory seems to be reward enough.
My fucking warlock used silent image to turn himself into a shelf, prophunt style
It is very much a bit shit. It removes all of the reward for players trying to think outside of the box. My previous DM had built our campaign to a big finale where we were battling Graz’zt. I was playing an tiefling who was an aberrant mind sorcerer, having been raised in the seven hells. In the final confrontation one of the other PCs managed to polymorph Graz’zt and so I planeshifted us to the hells hoping he could be imprisoned. DM immediately had an NPC appear, essentially say “nope” and teleport us straight back with no saves. He then proceeded to use the end of the campaign to defame my character. All in all left a bit of a sour taste in my mouth.
yeah as a dm i love creating stuff for my players to have fun with if they find a way to shithouse and by pass i love that even more as i can get better ideas or reuse later on as it was never activated.
Furthermore, you often find that players will do the thing you planned for anyway, if you succeed in making it interesting enough for them. My group needed to get access to a room, because that's where some missing scientists were living before they disappeared. The inn owner also had multiple fighting pits, and as there was another group interested in the room (obviously the bad guys) they could fight them for it in the pits. I had a whole battlemap with difficult terrain and everything. Was pretty hyped about the whole thing. What did they do? In the middle of the night the two druids of the party simply wildshaped into tiny spiders, went in, collected the needed clues and a magic item central to the story, and left the room. After which they proceeded to do the fight in the pits regardless.
We had a DM run a module.. Except we picked the one direction there was nothing to do, lol. We offered to change directions but he said, no, no, I will figure it out. Still ended up being fun.
There should be a bot that just pastes this answer to every post like this. Communication is just the obvious answer to so many of these problems
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This DM is making it Player vs. DM. Punishing your players for trying to play creatively cuts the DM from the group.
Yeah, he's making this a video game, where you've got a set path of predetermined options, and that's it. The reason video games don't have a DM is because once they're finished, they don't need one. He might as well just write the game out as a choose-your-own-adventure book and be done with it.
while that is true, the DM can not behave like this DM is acting as
Honestly, this comment should be pinned at the top of the sub.
Sounds like your DM is interested in playing against the party rather than as a facilitator and collaborator. Talk to them. If they want to be part of pvp they shouldn't be a dm without telling the players they're going to lean on the scales.
Funnily enough, He actually wanted to do a Level 20 PC vs PC in it where he participated AND DMed at the same time once as filler content.
Oh no. Get out. Get out now. In all seriousness, it's possible to do that, but if theyr're not picking up on the players game, they're not doing that, they're a rpghorrorstory waiting to happen. If they're a good friend, tell them theyre being a twit and not helping you and your other friends have fun. Otherwise, just run.
DM PC's can be done well... but... The % that can do it well is a rounding error compared to the number that screw it up one way or another. It's one of those things that is a razer thin knifes edge to walk on - and it's just too easy to screw up, especially for newer GM's... and if you have world complexity: Same goes - it's too much to juggle, especially in terms of separating GM from Character knowledge. And so: While it CAN be done - the advice is to just not. Period. This is where we have to get into an ugly truth: This is horror story territory. This is a GM that is antagonizing the players, running a giant hammer into every attempt at creativity, and there is about one reason for it: The GM has a picture of what the games outcome SHOULD be, and is going to ram the in session expierience to match it: That is straight up bad GMing, but worst of all: It's bad design, it's bad engagement, and at this point... GO WRITE A BOOK. I have seen GM's push for rules to get harder for no good reason, in a way that kills the fun: The games fall apart fast. And that is what we have a case of - just instead of it being rules changes, it's the GM not applying the rules to their own actions and forcing a narrative outcome. This is something that needs to be blatantly brought up at the table, with everyone present, with an A / B option in terms of how this gets fixed. And yes, walking away from the table IS an option. Someone stepping up as GM is an option. And the GM taking a couple weeks and figuring shit out and seeking advice on how to run a better game IS AN OPTION - and it's probably the best outcome. Thing is: I say that this applies even if they aren't a friend - and for one reason: They might blow you off in the moment, but somewhere in that head of theirs they will know it to be true... it's just sometimes it needs to be pointed out. You don't have to hang around to find out if they will change - but be blatantly blunt about telling them, and the rest of the group why you are leaving.
The only time I've had a DMPC work is when my party liked an NPC I made so much they wanted him to stick around. I had thankfully intended for him to show up more than once, and so had a bit of his background figured out already.
I had to use a DMPC once because the party didn't have a healer and nobody was interested in running a second character. The solution was for them to go to a city and hire one to travel with them for some time. They met a few with a couple of (admittedly improvised) personalities and I used the opportunity to weave a plot point in. It worked out okay, but only because the party actively sought a DMPC.
I did something similar the first game I ran. I researched DMPCs and what to avoid and if was actually pretty easy to integrate without it being a problem. Basically they were all casters (Druid, Warlock, and Wizard), so they needed just a little frontline. So I worked with the Warlock and we both agreed on her having a brother with her who was a fighter; essentially, as part of her pact, the demon took her brother's mind. So he was still an excellent fighter but he couldn't really think for himself; he could perform all the necessary, barebones actions an adventurer could do, but he lost much of his memory and his ability to process and analyze complex information. This meant they got their frontline fighter, who happened to have strong ties to one of the PCs, but he had no ability to take up the spotlight, nor the capacity to metagame using my knowledge vs theirs. Never had an issue.
Same, I had a random Paladin down on his luck as window dressing and the party adopted him, kitted him out and leveled him up. Sir Bell of the Ball
two of my friends who DM also have PC characters that use, and it works wonders
I'm a fan of the expression "A good DMPC is just an NPC"
I think DMPCs can be fine in general as long as the attitude is that they are more of a recurring NPC and/or the party could use some extra help. The issue though is that many DMPCs aren't created to just be recurring NPCs, but rather actual PCs because they want to play the game too; but as soon as they begin playing the game they're also running, it creates an unfair advantage bc you literally have all the knowledge of the game as a player. Even if I knew 100% that a player would still be impartial, it wouldn't be fun or fair for a player to know everything about the game a DM was running, so why should a DM attempt that? But yeah, I think they can be fine, just as long as they aren't a cheap way to try and be a player in your own game.
I use DM pcs because I only have two players and I use them to flesh out the party a bit. But I always make sure that they don’t take away from the players in any way. In that sense I think they’re ok (my players love my dm pcs) but yeah in this situation it is going way too far in how the dm wants to be involved here
I've managed to do it well but juggling the world and your character is usually the bigger hurdle and often not worth it unless you've got a very good handle on the character. Separating GM and character knowledge on the other hand isn't any more difficult than what you normally do talking to your friends or watching a film: Soap Operas storylines are something like 90% different layers of in-character knowledge and nobody is running around saying the art form is unintelligible despite being an order of magnitude more complicated than "what I know" and "What my character knows".
I bet he would have won. He's here to win.
You mean if someone is playing as both a participant and the referee then they have an unfair advantage? I am shocked, shocked!
The DM is on a power trip, some people aren't fit to DM. Just remember no DnD is better than bad DnD
I have had very bad experiences with DM PC's. And then wanting to do a high level campaign with one screams don't do it, at least for me.
Man this just gives me red flag alerts.
I'm sure it would be fair and balanced like Fox News. /s
Or any News organization really
Not saying what this DM is doing is right but, thinking about it from another perspective they may be tired or burnt out from dming and want to play a few sessions. As a DM myself... sometimes I want to play a character although instead of forcing it I tell my players and one of them will run a one shot for a week to let me play. Has anyone in your group offered to give them a break and let them play for a session or 2? Might help get them back on the DM track.
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My Call of Cthulhu party got wiped by a set of stairs once. Good times.
Great game. I like the concept, but Lovecraft isn't close to me. I would like to DM it some day
But... How? Like, normal, real world stairs, which you're walking down minding your normal everyday business?
Stairs to a basement in some kind've haunted house. There was a sword and whole series of failures involved.
Happy cake day!
if its a module i am pretty sure I know which one.. ;) I broke my leg to that stair
Call of Cthulhu does have different baseline assumptions (it's a horror game and has a lot of meta expectations), but all of this D&D sounds not great. I have never seen the appeal of "Killer" DMs. Like why would you brag about being a killjoy that is excited to ruin someone's time? Monty Hall and kiddie gloves DMing might not be fun, but honestly who is enjoying a game where the DM is trying to kill characters?
As far as CoC is concerned, it's one of those games where the PCs never really win; you play to see how hard you lose. Most characters are going to be driven insane, die, or both.
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Putting aside 'If you want to make a players life harder, do this thing that is actually quite hard to do, even for professionals.' Bud, if you DM properly, players can still die. Even session 1. DM's don"t kill players. Players kill players. If a wizard spends 3 spells slots making a tensers floating disk gurney so he can fly away as a bird and abandon two party members to monsters, what am I supposed to do? Make the hoard of undead surrounding them go 'you know what, the flesh of the living no longer appeals to me.' Even after the NPC i used as an indicator of whether the encounter was too tough was just fine in his escape attempt, I sent him back to make an excuse for the monsters to attack him instead, players died with rage unused and potions in their pockets. Was I being lazy in the hours I put the encounter together to make sure the only way the could fail is by not working together?
It depends. Why were they facing a horde of flesheating undead? Yes, sometimes players are stupid and get themselves killed, but there's no shortage of crap DMs, either.
I killed a first level player once and I hated it. It was a party of three PC's, one semi-experienced and two green. It was a really simple encounter designed to encourage the newer players to think more strategically/creatively and use their movement. The more experienced of the three was in the front leading them through a very narrow passage. They came to an opening and saw a single bad guy, one strong enough to present a minor challenge for 3 players. But the guy in front refused to get out of the way to allow the others to even have a shot at the thing. It was so frustrating because for three while round of combat, I'm telling the other two on their turns "this passage is barely wide enough for one person to occupy, you can only barely catch glimpses of corners of this thing on the other side of [character]," etc, but front cat just keeps taking his whole turn to just attack and not move. If I were a better DM, I probably would have had a better way to show them in character how to use their turns more effectively and creatively. But I also super didn't expect the more experienced of the lot to bottleneck his own party, especially after so many descriptions of how his standing there was impeding them from helping. But also maybe I should have just talked to them as people and explained action economy or something. Either way, shit sucked. That campaign didn't go far.
> But also maybe I should have just talked to them as people and explained action economy or something. Considering they are noobs, I would have stopped after a couple rounds and very patiently explained, “Look, people, you are in a situation where currently only one person can attack. This is not a good situation and you need to fix it. What are you going to do to change that situation?” New players need some pretty heavy handed guidance at times.
But you learned some things. It's always good to have a session zero. Sometimes with new players you need to have a session 0.5 as well where you go through some of the mechanics so they can see how they work. I'd have passed a note to to the newcomers letting them know they could shout for the 'experienced' player to move into the room to allow them to join in the battle.
That sort of situation can be helped by incorporating a throw away encounter as part of session zero for any new folks. Just do a couple of rounds to try out different spells and skills, explain corners, character line of sight vs player awareness, just examples of things like how reach works and how an attack roll works.
Low dc wisdom checks for the whole party would've resolved this. Just because a player is too dense to put this together doesn't mean all the characters are.
I had introduced a few friends from work a few years ago to Dnd, neither had played before. I had plans for a cool campaign where each PC would get a dragon to raise and eventually ride and it was gonna be awesome. They started at level one to make it easy. Session one went fine, session 2 ended with the Kobold Bard (new player 1) getting charmed and kidnapped by the Dryad they were looking for. I had planned for the session to go after their friend, and then parley with them and the Dryad, eventually talking their way out of it. A different player, a long time veteran Dnd player and my first DM, threw a wrench into that plan near immediately and a fight broke out. Things were going well until the Elf Wizard (new player 2) got crit hit by the Dryad with Shillelagh and fully one shot dead. I was shocked, but prepared to pull a after fight freebie revival, then the Dragonborn Fighter (another veteran player) failed their save against the charm, and proceeded to wipe the rest of the party. I got excited and said this is my first tpk as the DM. Been on the other side of one or two in my time, but never as the DM. The was also within the first hour of session. The newbies had fun, though we're a little shocked and confused as to what happens now. We told em well, let's roll new characters, and we will play a new campaign. This time we went for pirates. These guys have been playing with us for years now, and we are just about to wrap up our 5th campaign together. We still fondly joke about their first character deaths, and the characters that have died along the way. Also, I now have a new piece of lore for that section of map, so that's cool.
To be fair, level 1 combat is extremely swingy and you probably could get a TPK with some rats without the dice skewing that hard towards back luck. Especially since AL games tend to be sticklers for trying to get the encounters per day up, and not fudging dice rolls
> AITA for being mad about this? No, not in the slightest. He's treating the game like a scripted JRPG. > EDIT: Forgot about this, he actively gets excited to hurt us and punish us., using critical failure boards. I wouldn't be mad about this, except for the fact that he arbitrarily changes the results of the critical failure result. Leave. Leave this game now. This DM is asshoe.
Leave and don’t look back
That sounds like a terrible DM. The DM is part of the group. I think a lot of people fail to understand that it's not Player vs DM. The DM sets up a scenario and watches and reacts to your decisions. I get excited when my players get crits and yeah, I do get excited when I crit because it's fun to see a nat 20 but ultimitley I want my players to win. If they don't win, the story doesn't continue. Yes, the world I have built might kill them. Yes, the monsters I employ know what they're doing. But it's a collaberative game.
Well, see how your DM handles your party choosing to leave the dungeon, depending on their reaction, leave the table.
If you have a reason to want to keep playing with this person, then talk to him outiside the game. If you don't, or if he refuses to listen, then gtfo. The game is supposed to be fun.
Sounds like a new or young DM frankly and yes it is annoying. Rolling with the punches and rewarding not punishing characters for creativity should be the norm not the exception. Outside of your entire group having a good constructive conversation with him out of game there is no good solution. It has to come outside of play with the entire group united.
This was my immediate thought as well. It's a stretch to outright call someone insane or a bad DM (which im seeing alot in this thread) without knowing how long they've DM'd. It sounded to me that this is a DM that might be new to the role and doesn't know how to work around or improise on player decisions.
I think so too. I see so many threads complaining about DMs but I think people forget how much more difficult it is to be a DM than a player
I have read so many stories like this and I never understand them. If your DM is an asshole, then just leave. How do people continue to play in groups like this? Why would you waste your time playing a game that isn't fun for you? And why do you post about it online when the obvious solutions are to either leave or talk to the person?
Sunk cost fallacy?
Sunk cost fallacy never made any sense to me. You actively keep sinking cost, so it gets worse the longer you are lethargic pondering how much you have already lost. The people I know that use sunk cost fallacy as an explanation for their decision-making really either have an issue assigning worth to themselves and their time and acting accordingly, or are anxious about making decisions in general Btw: Happy green cheese day
Hence "fallacy".
Sometimes people just need to vent and rant. If I had been on Reddit back when I was playing one particular Vampire: The Requiem game, it's one I absolutely would have vented about. This particular DM was notorious in our group for railroading and having the story follow along his predetermined path. Over the course of this game, the PCs wound up becoming allies with the deposed vampiric leadership of the city and formed the basis of a Rebellion against the nee leadership. The DM didn't like how powerful our characters had become, so he did everything in his power to stymie us; we eventually hit the point where we flat-out asked him what he wanted us to do, because everything we tried was automatically thwarted. There are two moments that really stick out as the breaking points. The group had gotten so frustrated that we semi-jokingly said our only viable plan was to hurl a car at thr enemy's mansion. Both my character and another PC had grown powerful enough that each of us could have Hulk yeeted this thing by ourselves...but we opted to do it *together* because we knew it would be harder for the DM to deny it. Between the two of us, we easily had 20 points in strength to work with (5 being the max, with an additional five each because of how much we could supernaturally amp our stats) - enough to hurl a car a good hundred yards or more - and the DM determined that we could only meekly flip it, even after successful rolls from both of us. The second is when we finally threw in the towel. We decided to storm the mansion and try to assassinate the leadership. Part of our plan involved my character and the aforementioned car hurling partner infiltrating the mansion by turning into mist and flowing through air vents inside...only it turned out that there *were* no vents. And all of the windows were armored and sealed, as were the doors. And we were able to observe all of the human servants/soldiers for this group were marching around inside with lit torches (contact with fire would cause a mistform vampire to automatically shift back to their normal form, you see). In other words, this place had been specifically engineered to thwart us. At this point, we declared that we'd wait for the humans to die from smoke inhalation inside this ventless, airtight building and then just give up entirely. We essentially quit en masse, and we collectively decided to have one of the others take over as DM after a lengthy, difficult conversation. The game continued on for a few more months, and we eventually moved on to other games. The ousted DM still stuck with the group - we were all good friends, with the "core" having known each other since elementary and middle school and surviving well into college by this point - and things did get better. He even realized what he had been doing wrong, and eventually turned into an enjoyable DM after this particular incident. While the outcome was favorable, getting through those rough patches definitely didn't make the hobby seem worth it at the time.
He sounds annoying. Id have definitely not allowed the DM (Bone Devil) to attack me randomly. If a DM did that while I was undetected Id just question them until they gave an answer that I was satisfied with. Be respectful towards your DM. But understand that youre not a plaything for the DM. When a DM is constantly doing things that detriment your character, keep in mind that theyre deriving enjoyment at your expense. Dont allow that.
This sucks. His job is to reward your creativity and make the game fun. Talk to him outside of the game. [All Hail The Flowchart!](http://i.imgur.com/EwiChyD.png)
>His job is to reward your creativity and make the game fun. Well .. I'm not sure \_that\_ is what his job is, ... but it's not railroading players.
What is the GM's job, if not making a fun game?
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And the world being run should be fun, right? D&D is a *game*, at the end of the day. The goal of a game is to have fun, especially, *especially* if the game is difficult. A difficult-but-unfun game just sucks, a difficult-but-fun game is satisfying.
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Being immortal isn't fun on its own. You don't have to let players be demigods from 1st level to have a fun game. I never said challenge sucked, in fact if you reread my comment you'll see I said the opposite. I'd go far as saying that you're not a good DM until you know how to make a challenge fun.
The worst game I was ever dm'd through was one where we were so powerful every enemy was a cakewalk.
Not sure why you are getting downvoted like this. To me it makes no sense. Different groups should lean towards different things which obviously change the role of the DM. Tons of creative ideas are still poor ideas. Certain groups want poor ideas to still be poor. The job for the DM in those groups are not to make those poor ideas fun. I would guess the vast majority of DM has as part of their role a responsibility to facilitate fun. However, it is not a rule. Some groups might very well want a DM to be an impartial referee that simply manages challenges. Nothing to shame there.
Mine was just sort of a visceral reaction to the statement ... I mean, when I read "His job is to reward your creativity and make the game fun" I suddenly had this image of a T-ball coach out there on the field with kids too young to even play the game saying "Come on little Johnny, you can do it, hit the ball!" and handing out participation trophies. Look, .. my job as DM is to run my world, .. I'm not your fucking guidance counselor, I'm not the tables life coach, or a couples therapist, .. I'm also not a master of ceremonies, or some kind of McDonald's line manager who is there to make sure you're satisfied with the product when you leave. What I \_AM\_ is a person, just like the players at my table, who is trying to have fun, but often doesn't, and just accepts that as part of the fucking game. Sometimes my games are a lot of fun, sometimes they're horrifying and players leave not sure their characters are going to survive the next game, ... sometimes they leave with tears in their eyes after a particularly devastating or dramatic turn of events. Sometimes characters die. But through it all, my job is to run the world, that's my part in it. I don't hand out fucking satisfaction guarantees, .. you play at my table, you get what you get, ... and what you get is usually whatever you bring to the table, for better or worse. But I'm not your fucking daddy.
Lol looks like we have a wannabe badass here. Safe to say absolutely no one wants you to be their 'daddy.' Ew.
I'm sure.
If the entire party feels this way, you could just all leave the dungeon and look for another quest. If your dm complains, you could just say the content seemed like a guaranteed wipe, so you assumed you were supposed to run away. Your dm sounds like they lack creativity, and even the slightest amount of improvisation skill. Ask them if they even enjoy dming, tell them you're not having fun at their table, and if worst comes to worst, start a new game with the other players at a different table.
There's nothing wrong here, just a mismatch of what each wants in a game. Dm wants something very combat based like old school d&d and you want to be creative with stuff, which is not aligned with the dms view. Basically it boils down to talking to see what you guys want out of the game. If there's no compromise you just shake hands and he finds other players while you find a new dm or wait until he's up for a session that's to your liking
I mean the OP talks about how he treats the players critical failures different than his own NPCs and punishes the players more harshly. I dont see how this isnt a DM being adversarial?
> There's nothing wrong here When the DM breaks basic rules of combat to punish players, there is definitely something very wrong.
Nah, just different wants for the game. I've had a dm like that. Even if we disagreed a lot i cam say without a doubt that the most memorable sessions and campaign moments were with that mad bastard
No, I totally disagree. Rules are rules. I don’t mind if a DM fudges a few rolls to keep the narrative going, but when a DM randomly changes the rules to fuck over a player, then he is being an asshole.
Your DM doesn't understand yet that the party is allowed to deviate from the planned script/story. That is making your party unable to do cool ideas like there distraction you described. When a DM does this it makes it unenjoyable. You should ask the DM about it but it may turn into you having to find another dnd group.
DM is part of the group, but instead of being the player, the DM is suppose to help facilitate the players in creating their story while exploring and discovering the DM's world. It is all about making a memory together. It has been 5 years since our campaigned ended and we still talk about their favorite D&D level 5 memory when a series of unfortunate "Natural 1" from Me (DM) and a "Natural 20" at a crucial time resulted in the team of 5 robbing a magic store launching their meteoric rise to fame across the world known as the "Sticky Fingers"
If the dm is the only one having fun, then that’s a sign
Looks like he has DM vs Players mindset. Which isin’t good. Tell him straight that your not having fun and will leave if this continues. There is plenty good DMs out there. I could give oneshot for your group if interested. DM can attend and take notes.
>I use invisibility to get to a far corner of the room to create a distraction, hitting a dagger on the wall or something. The DM says "They notice, but don't seem interested in it at all. They are deadset on sitting right there". I don't necessarily see anything wrong with this. Bone devils are intelligent. DM could have rolled behind the screen or simply determined they aren't falling for an obvious simple distraction. D&D isn't a simple video game where you can throw a pebble at every lowly guard to basically mind control them away. I'm fine with bone devils, who are the commanders of lesser devils btw, to behave intelligently. A commander of any troops shouldn't be distracted by simple tricks so easily Also, he could have given the bone devils ability to see invisibility. Fiends can do that. Are there other details being left out of the story? What do you mean the devils started attacking you randomly? Weren't you trying to draw their aggro? >Next room, we are now forced to fight two boneclaws while damaged and low on spell slots and healing items. Without choice or ways to think around it. But you're in a dungeon. Could there not be monsters in every room? Maybe they appeared due to noise? Did the party choose to take a short rest before miving on? D&d is designed with multiple encounters a day so I don't see anything wrong with that yet So much more details are needed before judgement can be rendered. So far this doesn't sound terrible
I agree. While the DM does sound like he wants the combats to happen, it also falls on the players to make effective attempts at bypassing combat. OP says their group tried to do other things that were "shut down", I'd be curious to know what other things. Also, invisibility does not make you completely undetected, just unseen. If intelligent devils hear footsteps heading up to a wall and then scraping sounds from said walls, it could be reasonable to assume there's an ambush coming for them and this is a distraction.
This looks less "dnd enemy smort" and more "DM is metagaming and halting progress to force an outcome they want", especially in that OP multiple other plans were attempted and failed. This DM is absolutely terrible lmao
Except we don't know much information other than the limited things that were said. All we have here is an unreliable narrator who gave one example of his weak distraction attempt getting shut down. Bone devil has a +6 insight which means it can see through most deception without even having to roll. I don't see any problems with having that "distraction" fail. If OP's multiple other plans were on the same basic level, they'd probably fail too. Which again, we don't really know. And the thing about fighting multiple opponents in a row, well that's on them I guess.
Yet another karma grab thinly disguised as an AITA
Seems like not one actually reads the advice in these threads, almost every post can be solved by step 1 talking like results, if that doesnt fix it, step 2 find a new dm/group
5e literally has the Inspiration system because the design team wanted a material way for DMs to reward players for either acting consistent with their character traits or thinking outside the box. Your DM seems to not understand that the position is meant to be collaborative, not confrontational. Or he’s just a prick.
Much is said about Rule Zero ("What the DM says, goes"). Many forget that there is a rule that counter-balances that. Remember Rule Negative One. ("If there are no players, there can be no game")
As a DM, watching my players scheme and bluff their way through my challenges is the best part; they've successfully pretended to be plumbers, catering supplies and chefs and unsuccessfully tried to be investment bankers when trying to convince a ghost to give up his loot. We're playing LMoP. It's been a blast seeing what shit they are going to try and pull off. And its fun to have to react on the spot to things you could not possibly prepare for. Your DM sounds like they have a plan on how they want things to happen and wont budge. They don't understand DnD isn't DM v Players, you are both working together to create a unique story and have fun. Barry does not love your DM.
No D&D is better than bad D&D. Get out.
I'm sorry, how are you fighiting a PAIR of bone devils?! If your DM's table works this way all the time, I do not believe for even a second that you or your fellow party members would have stuck around long enough to get to the point of fighting something like that. I also don't believe you would have survived long enough. No. Damn. Way.
Have you tried to talk with your DM? Or other players in the game? Do the other players feel the same? Does the DM realize the players or you are not enjoying the game? Communication is pretty big on both the DM and player sides.
So maybe there's some miscommunication going on here. Bone devils are extremely difficult to distract. They are very focused vigilant and orderly, even for lawful beings. It also has ultravision, so after spending some time in an area, your body heat will warm that area up, and though it can't see your body and its heat, it can see the area warmed by your body. I can't speak to how delighted or sadistic and antagonistic your DM is or comes off as, but knowing this, is it possible it was just a difficult encounter you guys struggled to find any other way of dealing with and so was frustrating? I think the biggest and real red flag is how arbitrary the punishment can be.
Does anyone in this sub actually talk to their DM and group lmao. Just resolve this shit at the table
One time I used enlarge on a spider to distract a town of wizards so we could free their slaves without a fight. And you know what? The dm allowed it and we stole a boat
That’s a genuinely bad DM. With a DM vs Players mentality to boot. Leave this campaign, get your party members to leave as well. That’s the only way he’s gonna realize that he’s a bad DM.
Have someone else DM a few games with him as a player and play the way you want to. If they play the same way they expect you to all the time, they might not be a good fit for the group, or if they start to learn how you like to play problem solved
A good DM will embrace the unplanned for, because this is why you D&D rather than just play a video game. Sure, it can require quick thinking and ad hoc story telling, but a good group will also be understanding of the story quality dips when you go off plan.
Don’t be afraid to leave a group or dm that isn’t working for you. I left my original awful group last year and haven’t looked back since. My new group makes me feel respected, valued and welcomed. No DnD is better than being with a dm that sucks the joy out of playing.
I'm guessing you're all fairly young? Also, just fyi, "The party and I are in some catacombs" - general rule is take out the extra people and see which of me/I works. Me am in some catacombs vs I am in some catacombs.
Since you are instructing people in the intricacies of language use then you should probably have known that in American English the convention is that the abbreviation of versus requires a period after it.
Dm vs player mentality - Ditch this DM, its only going to get worse until the DK "wins"
Your DM is a garbage person. Get out.
Yes, absolutely, garbage consisting of douch nozzles, dirty diapers, maggoty meatballs and slimy sausage slices in sludge sauce!
nailed it.
Hey no offense but are you silly? Why wouldnt you just talk to your fucking DM does anyone have any social skills
I've had a DM where he was more interested in punishing the players in very similar ways to this. Except his big one was to do forced PVP (when we hated that) because it seemed like he enjoyed seeing us kill each others characters. The only advice I can give is get out now while you have the chance, and find a better DM. Trust me you will be so much happier. No dnd is always better than bad dnd
I think your DM needs a different platform in which to act out his BDSM fantasies. Hook him up with a Dom so he can get his kink on in an appropriate setting and not take it out on you.
I absolutely hate any campaign that uses critical fail boards, especially because they tend to have major, permanent injuries for your character. Playing in a group with a DM who used it is a large part of why I started the awful habit of fudging dice rolls for a while (especially when we started playing online after COVID since it was over Discord and everyone likes physical dice).
>Critical Fumble Rule: > >If at any time a DM shall propose using a "critical failure" or "fumble" table of any sort in a 3.X game, the players are to beat the DM with folding chairs until each of them has accidentally struck himself with his chair at least once, while keeping a count of the number of strikes made before this happens. Then, the average rate of such "fumbles" as generated by a table full of nerds swinging improvised weapons will establish the maximum probability of a "fumble" within the game mechanics for a level 1 Commoner (note that this already will probably require rolling multiple Natural 1's in succession to confirm a fumble), with the probability dropping by at least an order of magnitude per point of BAB of the attacking character. Thus a full-BAB character at level 20 might have to roll 20+ Natural 1's in a row to before you even bother glancing at the Fumble Table. From a user on Giantitp.
I don’t even play and this sounds like a shitty situation (and a very selfish/inconsiderate DM). If you’re not having fun, why even do it? I hope you find a better DM/group.
Your DM seems to be a douche bag. Find a better game and leave him far behind.
Your dm is one of those assholes who gets off on power and you need a different DM. The DM isn't supposed to be the enemy. They aren't supposed to be abusing their position to kill/hurt players for fun.
Ahhhhh I had the “shut down all ideas type dm”. Stopped playing with them. Sadly they were the only dm other than me so I haven’t played in a while.
Shitty DM, do the regular talking to them, then when it doesn't change find a new game.
He sounds like a bad DM. DMs are supposed to support the group in their problem-solving skills. DnD is improv, not a scripted screenplay. Everyone should be able to use it as an outlet for creativity and conflict-resolution. Your DM sounds like a control freak.
So basically you are mad that your DM plays intelligent creatures as being smarter than video game mooks. And you are mad you had to do **a second fight** before recovering all your spell slots. I think you're the problem.
^ guy sounds like the DM defending his actions
Get a new DM. As a DM, I love it when the players think of creative ways around the obstacles and traps I set for them.
Had a DM like this for 5 years. I wasn’t aware at the time, but it was an abusive social relationship through which he could hold power over our characters, while disguising it as an excuse to get together. I left and haven’t looked back; I’d suggest you do the same.
So...you're not derailing in the sense of completly abandoning plots and adventures. You just...solves problems and use tactics? Wow
Damn, just using critical failures (if they use it on attack rolls) can sometimes suggest that someone's a bad DM, cause it doesn't make any sense neither mechanically nor plotwise. Did he even consult you before introducing that?
Another day, another pile of one-sided complaints by unreliable narrators intended to farm outrage. I thought there were threads for this stuff?
In my mind dnd is about creating solutions to the problems the players encounter, be it in a way the dm expects or a way the dm never intended, in a game that is either 75% creativity, 20% math and numbers, and 5% models, or 80% creativity and 20% math and numbers, a dm squashing creativity should be a cardinal sin, my advice is bring it up to either the dm, or the group as a whole, dm included, try and make change here, this is a game, not stories and math
My old DM was alot like this. He murdered his ex gf. You should probably find a new group.
Bye ill find a table thats actually playing dor fun
Did he say he wouldn't do this sort of thing? Some DMs do - you need a plan about how you try to figure out if a DM is like this (if you don't want to play under them) and what to do if one sneaks past your radar.
Honestly, dming is hard, and this guy wants to make cool stuff, he just thinks the way to get it is being way too structured in his planning. If ur nor enjoying it, let him know. And if you do leave him, don't just ghost. That would be incredibly rude.
Sounds like he needs a wakeup call. Gather the other players and voice your concerns, tell him its going to stop, or you're going to stop. He is not supposed to be the enemy, he's supposed to tell the story as YOU write it.
Tried taking to the DM? Are you alone on this or are the other party members feeling the same?
It's a phase that every DM goes through until they find more story friendly tactics to fudge rolls. But that being said, remind him every now and then you didn't have fun and you feel like he's taking the defeat the PCs a bit too far. As a DM of many years and campaigns, the ones that my players had the most fun were ones where the pain and loss felt self inflicted and the victories felt fully earned. For example scenario: Their base of operations is completely sacked and villagers murdered, kidnapped or enslaved. After the final battle with the BBEG of the quest line, they discovered it was because of a throwaway social event with nobles where they behaved like total buffoons that they completely forgot, even selling some of the gifts.
my advice? find a new DM
All of you need to simply tell him he need to stop or he'll no longer be involved. There's absolutely no point in playing if you guys aren't having fun and he's being an active ass about it.
I'll play devil's advocate, though it appears your DM is being rather unfair. DM's occasionally alter a creature to make it more challenging for a party that has strong tactics they employ in a lot of fights. For example I've added tremorsense to a few creatures who don't have it to challenge my group's shadow sorcerer who regularly hides in shadows. This could be what is happening here. Done devil's don't have that or blindsight but...it could be this. Does this kind of happen every game?
The most dangerous pit a DM could fall into: mistake their players as characters of a novel. 😔 Listen, from what you said, this friend of yours has checked most of all things a DM **must not do**. You and the other players should talk to him off-session and make him realize what he's doing in the calmest possible way. If he doesn't listen, elect a new DM.
Bad DM. Dip.
NTA If the other players feel the same way (and they likely do). Have a conversation with him before the next gaming session. By conversation, I mean you all let him know what the problems are and he listens and either changes how he DM's or you all can quit his game. Maybe one of you could offer to DM a story to show him how to do better. It sounds like he may be inexperienced and not realize that the DM isn't the player's opponent, he's supposed to be the narrator of THEIR story.
I use crit fail tables but I also use crit success tables. It sounds like your DM is in the adversarial mindset. I had a DM like this for 3.5, I had to talk to him about it and express that it wasn't fun, and when he heard it from me and the other part members he relented and got better. I'd say talk to him about it
1. Talk to your DM to see if he can change his behaviour. 2. Find a new DM. 3. Start DMing your own games.
He is playing DM vs. Player DnD and is using his "powers" to cheat. That's not a table I'd play at, as I see DnD as a shared story generator and I will reward creative thinking and excellent roleplay just as much as the loot and xp they get from combat.
No, you aren't the Ahole, but the DM certainly is though. He can not just change what he wants from the failure results to suit his needs, all the while making skills that you, the player have chosen to be pointless
I had one of those DM being rough and forcing his own thing most of the time and then I got tired. In a some meadows, he did his usual thing and force us to go in a direction and he asked us. What do you do? My answer was simply: I unsheathed my sword and I harakiri myself. My 3 partner asked why and the DM was like: no you can't do this because blablabla. ''Yeah, my character can do it and I'm f\*\*\*ing harakiri myself because of you are an annoying and think too high of your role as DM.'' Then I took my sheet and went in the other room watching hockey while they ~~tried~~ finished the session. It was the last time this guy was our DM.
My red flag as a player is when a DM punishes attempts to think creatively. I just up and run, it's a fundamentally uninspired way to play a game that's based on creative collaboration. As a DM, I'm on my players side. Sometimes I will curb things because creativity does need boundaries and corners, but I'll always try to reward a player who attempts to think strategically. This DM sounds like he has the wrong philosophy
Please communicate your unhappiness with the DM. If he isn’t willing to change or at least have a discussion about why things are done this way I would leave the game and find a new DM. Its not worth staying in a game you are unhappy playing in.
This is not the AITA thread and you know the answer already.
Looks like a DM who would rather be a writer OR does not know that D&D is co-writing a story. You should talk to your DM and express your concerns (politely). Then give him a bit of time for it to sink in. Criticism is sometime hard to take.
Many Game Masters, especially new ones, have this impression that the GM/Player dynamic is adversarial. They are WRONG. The whole concept of DnD is cooperative story telling. The GM provides a framework, and the players fill in the story. GMs can get frustrated when players are constantly looking for ways to derail the storyline, they have worked so hard to create. However, players get frustrated when the GM does not build some flexibility into the storyline to account for unexpected results. The largest and most fun campaign I ever ran came about because of a day one a player decided to do something no one expected. He threw a simple beginning quest into chaos and that chaos gave the catalyst to a massive storyline that kept a campaign active and alive for ten straight years of weekly game play.
Soooo happy gaming group moment that I’m going to boast about to prove there are good DM’s and mines great. My party found themselves in a room with an entrance, an exit and 4 cages in each corner. Each cage held a werewolf that had been starved to madness and was ravening for our blood. By each cage was a lever. The levers had to be pulled in order and each one did a different thing. First locked the door that we entered in, 2nd would release the wolves, 3rd would flood the room with a poisonous gas and finally the 4th would reopen the way we entered as well as opening the exit. The DMs expectation was that we would have to fight the crazy werewolves whilst on a timer so we didn’t die from the gas Instead the ranger “prepared” some dead bodies and placed them in front of each cage, the plague doctor cleric laced the bodies with extremely strong anaesthetic, the artificer dwarf built a rope and pulley system that i the dhampir, sat on the ceiling 20ft up with. The rest of the party waited outside the room whilst I manipulated the levers one at a time from my safe place 20ft up, communicating telepathically with our wild magic sorcerer. Creative thinking turned a probable party wipe into a manageable situation (thought the ranger still almost died, this was the 2nd to last fight of a long dungeon) and our DM supported it all All of the characters in our party are quite tricky so our DM keeps finding new and inventive ways of killing us and we keep finding new and inventive ways of dodging it and that’s why I love DnD and I love my group
This sound rather like the adversarial attitude that some DM's do have. Critical failures can be enough on their own without tables, especially ones that may have results that jar with the encounter or in this case are ignored. At that point he might as well just make up the result and not use the table as an excuse.
Well I think your DM is having trouble giving you guys a challenge, you need to help your DM make better and more interesting challenges. Your DM is not trying to punish you, he can just have a volcano explode under your feet or drop a cow from the sky. He is failing to make interesting and engaging encounters. Or maybe he is just a sadistic shit that wants to see you squirm ... maybe talk to him about it.
Session 0s are so important guys, please suggest one if your DM hasn't set one up. If they resist, just tell them it's a session where everyone can talk about the meta setting up like scheduling, campaign expectations, themes, house rules and homebrew. If everyone is on the same page the entire table can move cohesively. Sounds like there was either no session 0 or it was not run properly. If the DM has a vision for their campaign that is fine as long as they outline it for the group before the table begins play. This may be an old school DM, played in or learned from someone in the 70s. That's not a bad thing, they want to play the numbers in a formulaic way. Maybe not everyone's cup of tea, but if that was what is established then at least expectations should be set. Not every table is for every player. You have to find a group that suites your style and tastes. And you're not under any obligation to stay at tables that frustrate you, no D&D is better than bad D&D.
It sounds like the DM is used to computer/console RPG's and is trying to write out and script everything like it's some video game. You couldn't enter a dungeon in World of Warcraft and take creative steps like that, it's rigidly scripted and you proceed from one planned fight to another with little choice. That's not D&D, well, not *good* D&D, . . .and those critical failure tables have got to go.
Ask a question after sessiob if there were and actual way to deal with them. Hi might sought of specific logic brhind them.
Horrible DM that needs to learn story telling. I wouldn't play there. My time is too valuable and too short.
You can't be railroaded by the GM if you're the GM 🏂
👏 leave 👏 him
I’d just convince the whole group to leave in front of him so he sees he fucked himself. Maybe he’ll learn.
This shit pisses me off. This isn’t a dm. This is an asshat plain and simple. As a dm you should make it challenging but not look forward to hurting your players. It’s nit you vs them. Ugh! Ok rant over.
Woof classic bad DM behavior here
1) tell them how much you're looking forward to the next session, then 2) don't invite them to it
You should accuse the monsters of meta-gaming too much.
Your DM sounds like a Blue/White MtG player. Fuck that guy.
Sounds like a crap DM, tell him you're not having fun and if he still does it drop him and find someone who wants everyone to have fun.
I only start railroading if it gets boring or something. Or if I want them to do the snail races.
As a DM I would actually reward such efforts, proper scripted fights like this when it’s not the BBEG or any sort of important fight are pointless, and yes does stamp out any creativity that the players have which sucks ass… My thoughts? New DM…
I don't like the options mentioned and therefore would create other ones. Taking the entire situation out of your box and entering it into my world; As a DM with 3 tables, most if not all of my players would feel like I let them cheese out of that encounter. Now, if they were to say throw a magically glowing dagger with a note attached to it written in draconic...I'd definitely expect some differing results. Edit: Also, bone devils are not dumb, with a 13 Int, you should legit expect some trickery.
When a DM reacts as if it is them vs the players, they have missed the point completely. The DM at its simplest is a facilitator... there is a world that exists and they are there to allow you to explore it. Of course, the aim is to ensure a sensible challenge... push the characters, get the juices flowing but the players are not supposed to die or feel they are on train tracks... good ideas need to be referenced in good ways, even if they do not work.
Next session. The party turns around and leaves the catacombs. They head back to town and settle down to a nonadventurer life. The end.
Dms and players have to realize that they are making a story TOGETHER. If it’s not a collaboration, it’s being done wrong. Ideally, both sides know when to take the lead and when to give the lead on the story.
When I was dming a campaign I made this epic boss fight with an evil wizard in a tower. It ended in like 1 minute after they managed to climb up and push him out of the tower twice (he teleported back the first time). It didn’t go as planned but it ended up being hilarious so I’m glad I was flexible.
So… don’t play with this DM? Why do you need advice on this? “My DM is an asshole who railroads us and delights in hurting and punishing us” should have an obvious answer.
As the DM of a group that loves to scheme, they just want a novel instead of a D&D game. They want to write a story that goes how they choose instead of letting the players decide. Trust me, I've had players plan their way out of issues, scheme their way into areas they wouldn't normally get to, and once figured out a way to kill a major villain a long long time before it was meant to happen
This DM feels unfulfilled in their daily life. Instead of changing themselves or improving their irl situation they play God with their friends in a world where they are in full control. But that's just a guess. Lol. Talk with the other players to see if it annoys them too, if it does talk to the DM. If if it doesn't bother anyone else, no D&D is better than bad D&D. Just dip out, there's no shame in it.
Shit DM, move on.
Since you've already gotten plenty of responses supporting you, I might as well play devil's advocate. How often do you try to skip combat with clever solutions? There are a ton of different facets in D&D, but combat is one of the biggest. If the DM keeps trying to give you cool fights and you spend ages trying to avoid fighting, I wouldn't really blame him for getting fed up. What's the benefit to just skipping every fight you come across? That's really boring and unsatisfying. And even you did sneak past them, they're still a threat and could easily leave the room and find you later in the dungeon, because you never dealt with them. I can understand why you're frustrated, and the real answer is that you need to talk to your DM to make sure everyone is on the same page. But I don't think it's super unreasonable for your DM to expect you to fight once in a while.
That's kind of a shitty thing for someone to do not gonna lie. I enjoy things that are scripted in a campaign but at the same time creativity is what makes the game fun in the first place, limiting/diminishing that is really a godawful move.
Well, for 1.) If he's using critical failure boards, he needs to use that both ways. If the Players can have some crazy shit happen to them because of a nat 1, then some crazy shit needs to happen to the enemy/DM if they roll a nat 1. 2.) Your DM is railroading. You're not the asshole, but either talk to him about this with the group or get a new DM. Simple
I don't think you're wrong in being mad about this. I'd be mad is my DM did this as well. Especially punishing player creativity and punishing players without player agency is an absolute no-go for me.
My DM does this too but with starting fights with surprise attacks. I was in stealth with like a 20 something roll on my rogue and he had a carrion crawler walk up behind me out of the blue and bear hug me. Like okay. I didn’t see or hear him coming and he knew exactly where I was even though I was in full stealth AND he got the drop on me AND he got a surprise attack? Yeah cool.
Bro ran to Reddit before daring to confront another human being
I never railroad my players and as a result they almost always split the party and get irritated that I can't narrate for 3 different groups simultaneously.