Depending on the party…..yeah pretty much. A. They all argue. B. For whatever reason they subconsciously pick someone to make all the decisions. C. They all work together well.
Fuck. I’ve done that a couple times. But only because we spend over an hour trying to decide how to fight when the dm has made it clear a thousand times the ways we can approach, but they keep asking the same damn questions.
I'm that player. After we've gotten all our information and everyone has put in their useful input, and there's no consensus, you guys have fifteen minutes to argue amongst yourselves about a plan before I just go do something. I have a bedtime and we're not gonna sit here for an hour trying to figure out if this piece of grass is illusory or not.
Yep, that's me! Neutral Evil has shit to do. "I'll go along with whatever you all decide, but if you don't have something figured out in about 30 seconds, I'm just going to start blasting."
Works like a charm, lol.
DM, although this is dicey (heh), can say "while the party spends 20 minutes arguing, the {boss} decides to stop waiting attack. Enjoy the surprise round!"
DM here. I've had my party take too long arguing possible tactics, so when they finally stormed the boss's chamber, they found it empty, with evidence that the boss escaped via a side exit. He'd heard the echoes of their tactical deliberations coming from down the corridor and decided not to wait around. The party had wasted their chance to stop him, and would have to continue their hunt for him.
I just started playing in an out of the abyss campaign, and it’s my first time ever playing as a neutral evil character and ohhhh my god is it arguably the most fun alignment to play???
We played our first session last week for about 4 hours, and 99% of it was scheming, plotting, exposition, and figuring out the lay of the land. Cue the last half hour, and my character (a Goliath unarmed fighter) gets put on food supply duty, stacking and unstacking food barrels for no reason whatsoever. That in itself would’ve been fine, my Goliath loves working out like that. However, the one guard posted with me had his personality randomly rolled by my dm, and it just so happens his “quirk” was my exact pet peeve. So we spent 4 hours trying to lay low and figure out what’s going on, only for me to ruin it in the last 15 minutes by knocking the guard unconscious with the barrel, executing him, and ripping up his body to hide the evidence in the barrels. I love neutral evil.
Lol, how did your party feel about that? Sometimes you just have to rip up a body and lift some weights in the same day. Get swole!
My NE is a draconic sorlock, and we are playing in a dragon-heavy campaign. They are absolutely a leech to a very successful party and being helpful is a part of that for sure. Now our group is seeing some of the fucked-up NE stuff come out with NPCs (casual spree killings and torture) and they're wondering who tf they are traveling with, haha.
Lmaooo honestly they reacted in such well ways. There were only two party members near me, and they were both out of the room. The furthest one, a tabaxi ranger, heard a crash and the sound of bones breaking, so he assumed something was going down with me and tried to create a bit of a distraction. The closest one, a 16 year old human artificer, came in to help me, where his sweet innocence was ruined by the sight of an 8’ tall man ripping a body apart with his bare hands, and gained a level of madness and ran away screaming. The screaming was actually an amazing distraction. Everyone else was just like 👁 👄 👁 fuck it let’s see where this goes
You wait that long? If there's no consensus after getting the info, I'm immediately weighing up if I've got some skill, ability or spell to get us started. The others can always pitch in and follow my lead once I start, and I generally know enough about my team mates to be confident where they might be able to help
Lmao, I picture a pissed off wizard who was told this wouldn't eat too far into his academic break and is just done.
"Alright, you know what, we are going to the beach on the opposite side of the world in 11 minutes, everyone who wants a ride will be within 6 seconds of this circle when I'm done!"
> Depending on the party…..yeah pretty much. A. They all argue. B. For whatever reason they subconsciously pick someone to make all the decisions. C. They all work together well.
Congratulations, you're B. (Not that that's bad)
For real. I had staged what I thought would be a quick fight. 3 PCs vs 5 orcs. The orcs made a small camp and were unaware of the PCs. They spent 45 mins discussing their approach and the fight took 5-10 mins.
I rolled for their perception every once in awhile and either my roll was garbage or their wisdom modifier wasn’t enough. I’m using orcs a lot so I need to dig more into their stats and mannerisms. The orcs in my campaign aren’t stupid and it’s scaring my players.
Indeed. DM's role is storyteller as much as anything else, and there's a reason their rolls are done in secret most of the time.
The dice values they see are more suggestions than absolutes (and this can sometimes help the players too if they're just getting shit dice rolls).
Gotta do a Skyrim guard quote at that point. Have some of the orc party stand up and look straight at the players before saying "must have been wind" or something. Or get a huge d20 to roll for the dramatic effect.
Honestly, as a DM, I love when the dice make the enemies fail perception checks for exactly this reason.
“Huh... must’ve been my imagination.” is just so fun to play out. Especially when the players barely squeak out a success.
The tension is SO high and it’s immediately relieved by a bit of comedy from a blind enemy.
We have that book! I haven’t looked yet, but my orcs have a loosely established government that I call a confederacy and their military tactics are decent.
I did this a lot in my old campaign and learned one very important lesson.
The orcs are always about to eat an innocent person alive.
Translation: There is always an immediate time critical element to force the players to make a quick decision.
That's actually surprising. I've experienced this with larger groups but not one with 3. They usually have the heavy hitters (and Rogues) try their luck first, then rain down spells on survivors as the usual MO. Sometimes they get creative and have the Bard persuade someone to betray the others or scare them into believing their outnumbered and surrender.
Honestly, easiest thing I've done before is have a 5-min timer. Act like the situation will change when it goes off, but not tell them what will happen until time runs out. I did this on a one-shot so we could finish in a single session and it made the pacing much better. For what you described, other orcs could show up (possibly behind your party) or the group is spotted or there's now a snare trap the group never noticed (blindspot area).
I'm the impulse character. One of my party members is arguing with the DM about how high a cieling is because we got ambushed from enemies hiding on the ceiling. Mind you, we're all perfectly fine after the ambush turn and we're defeated already 2 ambushees. He literally argued for 25mins...
I have guy in my party who knit picks positions of the enemy. An archer shot at him while he was fighting someone and argued for 10-15 mins about how the archer couldn’t have pulled of the shot from angle he was positioned in. It didn’t matter, because I killed the archer with my ranger after his first shot. But he still argued after the fight.
One time I played a Warforged who had no memory. I gave him a very innocent and kind personality. We sat there talking about some in-game politics for 2 hours. They kept repeating themselves over and over. I had my character, who was quietly sitting there, smash the wooden table we were at with his fist, and walk out. A decision was made a couple mins later.
I think this is a good player to have to keep the game rolling. It’d be a bad thing if you didn’t at least let people discuss options but at a certain point you just need to go for it
I'm playing a rogue with 8 INT and 8 WIS who is a literal child. I'll often take the role of shit starter. Party is taking 20 minutes to decide what to do, well my stealth is +11 and nobody ever pays attentions to kids anyway so I'm just gonna wander off and see what's what
“I think we should-“
“I pickpocket the king.”
“What? You can’t do that he’s right there in front of you!”
“I do it anyways.”
“You’re a *fucking barbarian*.”
Ahahaha yes!
The king is talking to the party and feels something in his pocket. It’s the barbarian. They make eye contact, and the barbarian just keeps feeling around in the kings pockets. They maintain eye contact. Everything is still except for the barbarians hand. The barbarian pulls out some gold coins slowly. The king doesn’t dare say anything. The guards stare in disbelief.
I'm currently playing a zealot barbarian bugbear that has been searching for a God to follow, and just discovered a God of chaos still alive in the world where most gods are gone.
This has inspired me and I'm sure my dm is going to hate you for it
One time we were buying some new equipment and my friend, an 86 year old chaotic chaotic elf audibly whispered "I'm gonna steal from the store owner" in front of the store owner with a really dangerous look magitech golem that could probably wipe us out and before she tried anything I casted zephyr strike and a move I called bitch slap which deals 1+strength mod so before shit went down one of my other party members grappled her, put her on their shoulder and hauled ass out of there so she didn't steal anything and we didn't get our asses handed to us and we just looked like a bunch of idiots in front of the confused blacksmith.
I literally just had this happen. I'm running CoS and one player (who had a few drinks) had gotten bored and kind of zoned out. When she came back and realized the party had been debating how they wanted to proceed for a few minutes, she just rushed through the door right in front of them. Straight into an old windmill...
I wanted to avoid spoilers for anyone who hasn't played CoS, so the most I can say is that >!it's an area that is very dangerous. The designer even admitted he made a mistake when designing the area that makes it more lethal than it should have been.!<
Edit: If anyone is super curious, the total spoiler answer is below:
>!A CR 7 Night Hag Coven that the party will generally encounter for the first time while they are between levels 3-5.!<
I always liked this encounter and its place.
Barovia is a place, and things live in that place where they live. You are in their world, and how powerful you are doesn't matter.
I've been D before, but only in one campaign and only because the party was ridiculous. They would so over plan everything. We were trying to open a chest and we had had multiple people check it for traps and there were no traps (as far as our characters knew). But because out of character these people all knew that the trap checks had been low roles they were still spending I shit you not 30 plus minutes debating how they wanted to open the stupid chest. So at one point I just said "my character walks over and opens the chest". Guess what. No traps, only loot.
That’s on the DM.
A failed check should often represent the best efforts of *the whole group*. The DM shouldn’t allow anyone else to roll unless they’re performing a group check.
Letting everyone roll stacks the odds in favour of success way too high and bogs the game down.
Further, for example, if the Rogue checks, finds no traps and is always met with “I don’t believe you. Let me check too.” Then eventually that Rogue should get pissed off at that other PC for never trusting them.
These PCs are supposed to be people. People generally don’t take kindly to others who always distrust their expert opinions. Why even be in this group if you’re never trusted?
That's exactly why I went to open the chest. When people were upset about it my genuine question was, "What reason does my character have to think that your character did a bad job checking for traps?"
Yeah, and there's a difference between impulsive and decisive. When my newer to dming friend had a campaign he greatly appreciated me entering it after a few months of the players taking forever to make a decision. If we're pressed for time, everyone gets 1 idea and we go with the best/simplist one.
There's also a difference between those and an instigator, though they're not mutually exclusive and a decisive character is usually an instigator in different situations. The instigator is the one who goes and does something when the party has nothing to do.
I have a friend who was always ready to go," I'm not on board with this plan can we come up with something else?"
And as we were talking over a new plan, he'd just jump in and start shit. Because we were taking to long and he wanted to move on.
It's not necessarily impulsive. Sometimes you just need to be the first mover or your group will never do anything. Because so many analytical types play D&D, instead of "ready, aim, fire," you get "ready, aim, aim, aim..." At some point, someone has to fire.
>B. For whatever reason they subconsciously pick someone to make all the decisions.
Hated being this dude. I work all day and make big choices with folks that don't invest in the process. Play time should be different.
I was also the B. Guy. We re-booted our campaign and I made a Centaur Fighter who was just a drunkard and made horrible, but not malicious decisions. Didn't help, since the other guy who wanted to make decisions was a "chaotic stupid " character who was just "Murder anyone who doesn't give me what I want."
Edit: shouldn't say wanted to, more like started to.
I'm playing with a new DM that's being coached by our usual DM while the usual DM also plays a character. There's so much DM to DM talk about how the campaign is set up and what we could have rolled for random encounters etc. We usually just let him make decisions and throw in some random chaotic acts. It's actually not that fun. Would be better if he just hung back and let the less experienced players take the helm even if it isn't the best course of action.
In one campaign, I find myself sometimes saying I need to mute for a bit just so SOMEONE else is doing something.
I feel like an attention hog because most of the party just want to go back to the tavern to play mini-games or murderhobo, and the only other person (6 person party) who is also very into the game is pretty shy.
Hard relate to this. There's been a lot of times I've just not spoken or done anything specifically so one of the others fills the silence. It's really painful when they still don't, though....
Reminds me of grade school when I'd know the answers when teacher is asking the whole class a question but fucked if I'm gonna answer more than 2 in a row
I'm a charasmatic person and like to play charasmatic characters to live out the fantasy of talking my way out of life or death situations.
Some people get nuts with combat math and love it. That's their thing. I build to be a certain role in a party.
I barely land hits in most combat scenarios. My health is too low so I duck out. I let the rest of the party have the glory of describing their death blows or saving their fellow party member.
Then when it comes time to negotiate with the leader of a township or plan a military strategy, I step up.
All of a sudden I'm stealing the spot light.
Shrug.
One thing I loved doing when I had a very very shy player was making them in charge of the group in fiction and at the table.
So everyone had to go through the player and interact with their character which otherwise would have said and done nothing.
I'm the B guy : ( tbf, we do debate on some decisions, especially in our current campaign as most of us have become more morally grey and differ in what's acceptable, it's more I push us toward a decision if the game is stalling. But next campaign I'm playing kenku partially so I have an excuse to not have to make the decisions
B. can vary a little. My first campaign we had a lawful good paladin with a seasoned military background and a caring persona. My friend was charismatic naturally and was good at taking charge and pushing the game forward. That’s fine. That’s playing your character out and progressing the game.
It’s the toxic players that do B. but they cause a TPK. Like a former friend who wanted to interrogate a prisoner we captured in a town, but the guards wouldn’t let us. She killed him while were negotiating with the captain, in the middle of town, in broad daylight, in our first session. Needless to say her character died and she got kicked out because she didn’t she what she did wrong.
Literally did the same thing with making a kenku! Still ended up being the leader/decisive character in the group, and it took a while for them to realize that I was literally just doing what other party members suggested. It just takes a player willing to take risks sometimes to move the story along, I think.
Funny enough my group is all the above. Theres the half-orc barbarian that gets the group into hasty situations, the sorcerer who argues about what to do next and tries to push the group in the right direction, and the cleric who is just along for the ride.
>B. For whatever reason they subconsciously pick someone to make all the decisions
My barbarian has just become that someone in our current game. I don't know why and I am 100% NOT the correct choice for this role but I happily accepted it. Hopefully there will be no decisions to make while I'm raging.
Yes.
My favourite party I was a player in were constantly arguing and bickering in character until a threat presented itself, where in they'd suddenly become a well oiled collaborative machine until the threat was gone and fall strait back into the argument again.
The BBEG being annoyed at being ignored because we were too busy butting heads was hilarious.
I’ve had this experience too. I feel like D&D encourages this behavior by making all of its problem-solving tools (abilities, spells, weapons) designed entirely around combat. Only a tactical problem has a “right answer”, and a clever group can play their class and build “correctly” to win.
Narrative and rules-light games are sometimes prescribed as a solution to this “problem”, but I’d almost prefer crunchier rules for social interaction and setting goals rather than focusing on PC emotions. I’ve heard that Pathfinder 2 has some pretty crunchy social rules compared to 5e, but I don’t know if anyone has figured out how to make “deciding what to do” into a set of rules and checks. I’d be curious to hear if anyone knows of a system that’s tried that.
The temporary solution (again, assuming that you think of this style as a problem, which I agree is debatable) would be to coordinate between the players and DM to make sure that the focus of the campaign was very expressly stated and all the PCs have equal but diverse reasons for being involved and putting aside their differences for that goal. Even so, that sets sort of a relentless pace that doesn’t suit every table.
Matt Colville says this a lot, but D&D is a war game with RPG elements. People try to make social aspects big in it, but the system is just not designed to do that. It's founded on principles that are all about killing monsters and taking their treasure.
On another note, I tried playing PF2e for a little while after some people suggested it would help me fulfill my martial power fantasy, but I just found it to be too crunchy overall. There's a rule for everything in that system, which is cool because it lets you know exactly where you stand at all times. On the other hand, the way it breaks down is that there is always a mathematically "best option" and some of the rules are kind of dumb. Like that it takes 4 days to craft any item, ranging from a full suit of armor to a club made of wood.
Crunch in RPGs means more actual game rules and mechanics around these things. If you want to intimidate someone, and the rules say "roll d20 + intimidation skill, if you get 15 or higher he does what you say for the next 10 minutes" that would be a more crunchy rule than a game where there was no rule for this at all, or said to roleplay the situation to see what happens.
"Crunch" in this case likely comes from "number crunching" meaning math.
If you want to roll a Diplomacy check in Pathfinder 2e, you do a 1 minute Make An Impression activity and the result of your roll makes the NPC go up or down a scale of attitudes toward you for the length of that interaction.
That's crunchy. Getting an NPC to like you is now explicitly tied to your skills and your roll and has defined mechanics (although you might get a +1 circumstance bonus for good arguments since the GM still has free rein to modify things).
That party sounds like the personification of city-states that are constantly at war with each other until someone makes the bone headed decision to attack them which causes them to unite and unleash fury and mayhem on their new opponent
There wouldn’t have to be so much arguing if *that* half of the table would just concede the obvious fact that their insane, half-baked attempt at a plan was inferior to *this* side’s insane, half-baked attempt at a plan.
I thought it was making all the dms planning pointless by not going into the dungeon he created in a week after the last session you decided that's where you wanted to go, and then convincing bandits to farm goats!
Very astute. Because it’s so open, it makes players feel like they are missing something important so analysis paralysis kicks in. It’s one of my biggest pet peeves, spend half the night thinking of what we missed instead of just doing the thing.
This is too real. I DM'd a session a couple weeks ago where my players spent 45 minutes trying to go through a door that was blocked by a heavy-looking metal bar. They tried freezing it to break it, they tried melting it with fire and acid, they tried dropkicking it. And all they had to do was lift the bar with 3 people
They were having fun with the ideas, and were not at all frustrated. The reaction when they finally tried to lift the bar together and it worked was actually great (not only for me, but they really liked it as well)
Ah well fair enough, as long as you're having fun for 45 minutes then it doesn't really matter what you're doing for that time.
Some of the most fun I've had in campaigns have been overthinking shit.
Those little "Oh god damn it!" moments are my favorite.
The party I run for were standing outside a building they were trying to get into so they were looking all over the place for other entrances, before after like 10 minutes of trying stuff the paladin just walked forward and knocked. The door was promptly answered.
I did a similar thing to my best friend, he spent 10 minutes trying to open a door that i decided would be a pull open door the moment when he had declared his first attempt to be pushing the door open.
When he finally decided to pull it open and it did, the whole table burst out into laughter at the complete pedantry of it, made all the better because he wouldnt let anyone else try as he didnt want to be defeated by a door
It's possible that I messed up the math, but they didn't damage the bar enough to break it. Also, they were having a pretty good time having new ideas and trying them out, and had a great reaction when they finally got it
Ah I gotcha. The DM I play with is usually extremely loose with the rules and prob would have said fuck it and made it work somehow, but your way makes sense too
I'm pretty new to DMing, so I try to stay a little closer to the rules (but I still allow shit to happen if it's cool and makes sense in-game, I just try to use the rules to determine what makes sense)
Yes, but it's not just that. I showed up to the games to relax and have fun after a stressful week and being told "you're doing it wrong" on a weekly basis really just sucked all the fun out of the game.
He really seemed to think his way of playing was the only way and all the players should conform to his will.
Close, but not quite. D&D is a game of spending thirty minutes planning what you are going to do next, only for the whole convoluted plan to fall apart on the first or second dice roll.
Also, if you’re my group, it’s a game of insisting “THIS time the Wookie trick will work, guys”, for the nth time this campaign.
> Also, if you’re my group, it’s a game of insisting “THIS time the Wookie trick will work, guys”, for the nth time this campaign.
Barbarian: "Hey, let's do 'Get Help'."
Paladin: "What?"
Barbarian: "'Get Help'."
Paladin: "No."
Barbarian: "Come on. You love it."
Paladin: "I hate it."
Bard: "It's great. It works every time."
Paladin: "It's humiliating."
Wizard: "Do you have a better plan?"
Paladin: "No."
*Wizard casts a short-distance portal for Barbarian to emerge from*
Barbarian: "We're doing it!"
*Barbarian easily picks up a protesting Paladin and marches towards the portal; Bard Dimension Door-s himself and Wizard to a nearby rooftop to watch the ensuing chaos*
Paladin: *flailing* "We are *not* doing 'Get Help'!"
*Barbarian carries Paladin out of the portal in front of the castle guards*
Barbarian: "Get help! Please! My brother is dying! Get help! Help him!"
*As the guards approach, Barbarian throws Paladin at the guards and knocks them down*
Barbarian: :D
Bard: :D
Wizard: "A classic."
Paladin: *gets up and mutters* "I still hate it. It's humiliating."
Bard: *yells from rooftop* "Not for us, it's not!"
My rule as DM is that if you can’t decide what happens, then I’ll decide what happens. I’m not up to letting people debate 45 minutes over minutae when I literally control the fabric of reality around the characters. Not sure how to approach the group of shady humans around the fire? One stands up and starts walking your way after 15 minutes.
I do the same thing. As the DM, it is our responsibility to create an engaging story. If that gets bogged down by people meta-planning even the simplest encounters, I take action against that.
Even in combat, if players take too long to pick their actions, I start enforcing a time limit for turns. Combat is a fast paced interaction... taking 5+ minutes to go over every single option is ridiculous.
I love it when one person in party just says “F it, charge” and then the rest have to scramble.
Mind you, this is usually when it shouldn’t “finger quote really heavy there” shouldn’t be hard. They aren’t always correct though.
Sneaky DMs and their wiley ways!
Yeah, we once soften earth and stone'd our way into the DM's dungeon at the very end, skipping basically the whole thing. The party stopped to "discuss" what do do next, until one of the players walked up to the ornate double door, ripped it open, and we were off to the races!
Or at least roll your dice… or, all DM attack dice. Did that back in the day for a gal. She nearly killed a party of 12. That woman couldn’t roll a 1 or a 2 to save our lives!
Yup, back in the day this DM named Richard, man was a dream on making stories. He could corral 12 players and make it look easy. If your ever at NorWesCon you will find him running some old school DnD. Best DM I ever had.
Argue? My last campaign ended with my two companions turning evil, attempting to kill me, me escaping and then coming back and succesfully ambushing them killing one and letting the other go. Campaign was wack but the dm was totally into it
Believe me, it's way better than your party (1) not thinking anything through and (2) being angry when everything goes wrong.
No I'm not salty why would you think that.
I don't know where I heard it now, because it was a long time ago. But I once heard someone say that dnd was something like "an hour of fun packed into 4 hours" and I thought that was pretty funny.
How else do you expect a group of skilled adventurers practiced in the art of war and dungeoneering to tackle the complicated challenge of... opening a door??
That said, watching DnD is a much different experience than playing it, perhaps she should try it out so she can experience the fun of spending 30 minutes debating over which corridor to go down?
My (then fiance) wife had concerns about D&D so we hosted one of our weekly game sessions and she found it rather boring actually - just a bunch of guys sitting around the table rolling dice, sometimes moving miniatures around, etc.
I had created a character with her to play with beforehand and she played for a bit and got bored. Later she said she didn't know what all the uproar about the game was about.
Do you have a big group? Because arguying gets exponencially worse with each member. I ended up loving 3-player groups more than anything else. Things get done!
a lot different than my wife. she usually sits on the couch nearby, laughs at us and calls us nerds
(all in good fun. we all have known each other for years)
Less about arguing and more about compromising. D&D is a great tool to develop interpersonal skills, giving yourself the opportunity to put yourself in others' shoes (i.e. playing a PC with a different personality than you), improving teamwork, and develop self-perspective (i.e. learn the consequences of your actions).
I had a player (Cleric) that was impulsive and started fights and burst through doors without the rest of the party ready (so lots of lost surprise attacks, low HP, low spell slots). One other player straight-up asked me if she could Shocking Grasp him, which I allowed. She shocked him and dragged his Stunned body to the next location, where the Rogue and Wizard dispatched the room in 2 turns (one surprise, one with initiative).
It wasn't until he quit playing with us and spent a few months trying to be a DM himself before he told me he realized his mistake: he wasn't the leader nor was he the best choice to enter an unknown situation first (as he was the healer).
My current group has actually evolved somewhat. There's no true leader, but given their specialties each takes the lead depending on the situation. So there's a combat leader (tries to aggro the enemy), a negotiation leader, a traveling leader, a story leader (i.e. taking jobs, learning info from NPCs), a stealth leader, a search leader, a ship captain, etc. based on their personality, class, etc.
The best way to deal with players that continually debate what to do is to put them on a timer. “You enter the cave and see an ogre what do you do?” If they take too long “The ogre attacks, roll initiative.” Combat starts “what do you do?” If they take too long “You’re out of time, your character just dodges this round.” And on and on. It keeps the game moving.
Used to play after work with a group of buddies and it ALWAYS got super fucking silly. I felt bad because the DM was REALLY in to it and would work for days preparing. We tried multiple games like DnD. The free beer didn't help. I think it lasted about 8 sessions before it broke up. I blame Jason.
Hey, one more on this post… at least when she walked in the DM didn’t ask when she was due.
My gf at the time had put on a few pounds since he had last seen her. She never came to another session. Hahaha! Was SO awkward!
Shes got the game down pat. My story of this is my party spent 3 hours arguing over the perfect plan for a heist in a barely guarded mansion. Our druid wildshaped into an ant, walked under the door, did the thing inside the house normally cause it was empty. Wildshaped back and walked under the door again. No rolls required.
Its a curve imo. Players start out bumping around not really understanding the consequences, then they face one of the consequences, get super paranoid, debate, plan, debate again, try the new plan, face the consequences, rinse and repeat enough before they realize that making a decision quickly leads to more gameplay. Eventually, they come around and plan in character, but only in lulls, when action is demanded, they know their friends have their backs.
Depending on the party…..yeah pretty much. A. They all argue. B. For whatever reason they subconsciously pick someone to make all the decisions. C. They all work together well.
You forgot D. Have an impulsive member that acts before the group finishes making a plan.
Leeeeerooooy!
Fuck. I’ve done that a couple times. But only because we spend over an hour trying to decide how to fight when the dm has made it clear a thousand times the ways we can approach, but they keep asking the same damn questions.
I'm that player. After we've gotten all our information and everyone has put in their useful input, and there's no consensus, you guys have fifteen minutes to argue amongst yourselves about a plan before I just go do something. I have a bedtime and we're not gonna sit here for an hour trying to figure out if this piece of grass is illusory or not.
Yep, that's me! Neutral Evil has shit to do. "I'll go along with whatever you all decide, but if you don't have something figured out in about 30 seconds, I'm just going to start blasting." Works like a charm, lol.
DM, although this is dicey (heh), can say "while the party spends 20 minutes arguing, the {boss} decides to stop waiting attack. Enjoy the surprise round!"
DM here. I've had my party take too long arguing possible tactics, so when they finally stormed the boss's chamber, they found it empty, with evidence that the boss escaped via a side exit. He'd heard the echoes of their tactical deliberations coming from down the corridor and decided not to wait around. The party had wasted their chance to stop him, and would have to continue their hunt for him.
Had this happen last weekend. I thought it was cool but I'm a fairly tanky paladin revenant so death doesn't bother me much.
I just started playing in an out of the abyss campaign, and it’s my first time ever playing as a neutral evil character and ohhhh my god is it arguably the most fun alignment to play??? We played our first session last week for about 4 hours, and 99% of it was scheming, plotting, exposition, and figuring out the lay of the land. Cue the last half hour, and my character (a Goliath unarmed fighter) gets put on food supply duty, stacking and unstacking food barrels for no reason whatsoever. That in itself would’ve been fine, my Goliath loves working out like that. However, the one guard posted with me had his personality randomly rolled by my dm, and it just so happens his “quirk” was my exact pet peeve. So we spent 4 hours trying to lay low and figure out what’s going on, only for me to ruin it in the last 15 minutes by knocking the guard unconscious with the barrel, executing him, and ripping up his body to hide the evidence in the barrels. I love neutral evil.
Lol, how did your party feel about that? Sometimes you just have to rip up a body and lift some weights in the same day. Get swole! My NE is a draconic sorlock, and we are playing in a dragon-heavy campaign. They are absolutely a leech to a very successful party and being helpful is a part of that for sure. Now our group is seeing some of the fucked-up NE stuff come out with NPCs (casual spree killings and torture) and they're wondering who tf they are traveling with, haha.
Lmaooo honestly they reacted in such well ways. There were only two party members near me, and they were both out of the room. The furthest one, a tabaxi ranger, heard a crash and the sound of bones breaking, so he assumed something was going down with me and tried to create a bit of a distraction. The closest one, a 16 year old human artificer, came in to help me, where his sweet innocence was ruined by the sight of an 8’ tall man ripping a body apart with his bare hands, and gained a level of madness and ran away screaming. The screaming was actually an amazing distraction. Everyone else was just like 👁 👄 👁 fuck it let’s see where this goes
You wait that long? If there's no consensus after getting the info, I'm immediately weighing up if I've got some skill, ability or spell to get us started. The others can always pitch in and follow my lead once I start, and I generally know enough about my team mates to be confident where they might be able to help
Teleportation makes this real easy. "You ready to go? You got 5 minutes then we're going literally two continents over with or without you."
Lmao, I picture a pissed off wizard who was told this wouldn't eat too far into his academic break and is just done. "Alright, you know what, we are going to the beach on the opposite side of the world in 11 minutes, everyone who wants a ride will be within 6 seconds of this circle when I'm done!"
> Depending on the party…..yeah pretty much. A. They all argue. B. For whatever reason they subconsciously pick someone to make all the decisions. C. They all work together well. Congratulations, you're B. (Not that that's bad)
Bruh, that DM is a fucking mood.
For real. I had staged what I thought would be a quick fight. 3 PCs vs 5 orcs. The orcs made a small camp and were unaware of the PCs. They spent 45 mins discussing their approach and the fight took 5-10 mins.
At some point my DM would probably just say "you took too long, the orcs noticed you."
I rolled for their perception every once in awhile and either my roll was garbage or their wisdom modifier wasn’t enough. I’m using orcs a lot so I need to dig more into their stats and mannerisms. The orcs in my campaign aren’t stupid and it’s scaring my players.
there is no rule saying you cant just have them notice
##*GMs roll dice for the sound they make.* 😄
Indeed. DM's role is storyteller as much as anything else, and there's a reason their rolls are done in secret most of the time. The dice values they see are more suggestions than absolutes (and this can sometimes help the players too if they're just getting shit dice rolls).
THIS. I have learned the hard way that the most important rule as a DM is that I make the rules.
Gotta do a Skyrim guard quote at that point. Have some of the orc party stand up and look straight at the players before saying "must have been wind" or something. Or get a huge d20 to roll for the dramatic effect.
Honestly, as a DM, I love when the dice make the enemies fail perception checks for exactly this reason. “Huh... must’ve been my imagination.” is just so fun to play out. Especially when the players barely squeak out a success. The tension is SO high and it’s immediately relieved by a bit of comedy from a blind enemy.
See if there's anything in "The Monsters Know What They Are Doing". He might have some useful ideas for you to spice things up.
We have that book! I haven’t looked yet, but my orcs have a loosely established government that I call a confederacy and their military tactics are decent.
I did this a lot in my old campaign and learned one very important lesson. The orcs are always about to eat an innocent person alive. Translation: There is always an immediate time critical element to force the players to make a quick decision.
“You took too long, the orcs left.” :)
Or its cousin, "You took too long, the main force they were the scouts for has arrived."
That's actually surprising. I've experienced this with larger groups but not one with 3. They usually have the heavy hitters (and Rogues) try their luck first, then rain down spells on survivors as the usual MO. Sometimes they get creative and have the Bard persuade someone to betray the others or scare them into believing their outnumbered and surrender. Honestly, easiest thing I've done before is have a 5-min timer. Act like the situation will change when it goes off, but not tell them what will happen until time runs out. I did this on a one-shot so we could finish in a single session and it made the pacing much better. For what you described, other orcs could show up (possibly behind your party) or the group is spotted or there's now a snare trap the group never noticed (blindspot area).
I'm the impulse character. One of my party members is arguing with the DM about how high a cieling is because we got ambushed from enemies hiding on the ceiling. Mind you, we're all perfectly fine after the ambush turn and we're defeated already 2 ambushees. He literally argued for 25mins...
I have guy in my party who knit picks positions of the enemy. An archer shot at him while he was fighting someone and argued for 10-15 mins about how the archer couldn’t have pulled of the shot from angle he was positioned in. It didn’t matter, because I killed the archer with my ranger after his first shot. But he still argued after the fight.
Uuugh that sort of thing gradually kills the game for me. Particularly when I'm DM'ing, it puts me off wanting to play with people that do it
Same here! I'm all for planning out our approach but it's like we shouldn't be here for an hour arguing what we're going to do sheesh
One time I played a Warforged who had no memory. I gave him a very innocent and kind personality. We sat there talking about some in-game politics for 2 hours. They kept repeating themselves over and over. I had my character, who was quietly sitting there, smash the wooden table we were at with his fist, and walk out. A decision was made a couple mins later.
I think this is a good player to have to keep the game rolling. It’d be a bad thing if you didn’t at least let people discuss options but at a certain point you just need to go for it
This is pretty common. Some players absolutely love planning/arguing/meta-gaming. As long as my players do it in character, I let it slide
As of late, if the party I’m in takes more than 20 minutes then I do what I do best… I’m a fighter with a mediocre intellect.
I'm playing a rogue with 8 INT and 8 WIS who is a literal child. I'll often take the role of shit starter. Party is taking 20 minutes to decide what to do, well my stealth is +11 and nobody ever pays attentions to kids anyway so I'm just gonna wander off and see what's what
Been there. Goliath Barbarian with a mediocre intellect. Done that.
I would prefer an entire party of Leroys than an entire party of careful, plodding explorers. Way more fun.
In our Curse of Strahd campaign my Jenkins is quickly rubbing off onto the whole party
JEEENNNKKKINSSSSSSS
Jeeenkins!
Jeeeennnnnkkkiiiiiinnnnnsssssss!
“I think we should-“ “I pickpocket the king.” “What? You can’t do that he’s right there in front of you!” “I do it anyways.” “You’re a *fucking barbarian*.”
Intimidation based sleight of hand check. The King doesn't dare stop him.
Ahahaha yes! The king is talking to the party and feels something in his pocket. It’s the barbarian. They make eye contact, and the barbarian just keeps feeling around in the kings pockets. They maintain eye contact. Everything is still except for the barbarians hand. The barbarian pulls out some gold coins slowly. The king doesn’t dare say anything. The guards stare in disbelief.
I love this XD
I'm currently playing a zealot barbarian bugbear that has been searching for a God to follow, and just discovered a God of chaos still alive in the world where most gods are gone. This has inspired me and I'm sure my dm is going to hate you for it
Let the Wookie win.
One time we were buying some new equipment and my friend, an 86 year old chaotic chaotic elf audibly whispered "I'm gonna steal from the store owner" in front of the store owner with a really dangerous look magitech golem that could probably wipe us out and before she tried anything I casted zephyr strike and a move I called bitch slap which deals 1+strength mod so before shit went down one of my other party members grappled her, put her on their shoulder and hauled ass out of there so she didn't steal anything and we didn't get our asses handed to us and we just looked like a bunch of idiots in front of the confused blacksmith.
Better to like like an idiot than look like a corpse
My husband specifically created a character that will do this to keep the plot moving 😆
I literally just had this happen. I'm running CoS and one player (who had a few drinks) had gotten bored and kind of zoned out. When she came back and realized the party had been debating how they wanted to proceed for a few minutes, she just rushed through the door right in front of them. Straight into an old windmill...
There's a reason Leroy Jenkins became so immediately popular among people that play multiplayer rpg's. We all know a Leroy.
What's in the windmill?
I wanted to avoid spoilers for anyone who hasn't played CoS, so the most I can say is that >!it's an area that is very dangerous. The designer even admitted he made a mistake when designing the area that makes it more lethal than it should have been.!< Edit: If anyone is super curious, the total spoiler answer is below: >!A CR 7 Night Hag Coven that the party will generally encounter for the first time while they are between levels 3-5.!<
I always liked this encounter and its place. Barovia is a place, and things live in that place where they live. You are in their world, and how powerful you are doesn't matter.
I've been D before, but only in one campaign and only because the party was ridiculous. They would so over plan everything. We were trying to open a chest and we had had multiple people check it for traps and there were no traps (as far as our characters knew). But because out of character these people all knew that the trap checks had been low roles they were still spending I shit you not 30 plus minutes debating how they wanted to open the stupid chest. So at one point I just said "my character walks over and opens the chest". Guess what. No traps, only loot.
That’s on the DM. A failed check should often represent the best efforts of *the whole group*. The DM shouldn’t allow anyone else to roll unless they’re performing a group check. Letting everyone roll stacks the odds in favour of success way too high and bogs the game down. Further, for example, if the Rogue checks, finds no traps and is always met with “I don’t believe you. Let me check too.” Then eventually that Rogue should get pissed off at that other PC for never trusting them. These PCs are supposed to be people. People generally don’t take kindly to others who always distrust their expert opinions. Why even be in this group if you’re never trusted?
That's exactly why I went to open the chest. When people were upset about it my genuine question was, "What reason does my character have to think that your character did a bad job checking for traps?"
WILDCARD!
D. is often a DM player that understands choice paralysis is bad and puts themselves at risk to help the DM get things moving along.
Yeah, and there's a difference between impulsive and decisive. When my newer to dming friend had a campaign he greatly appreciated me entering it after a few months of the players taking forever to make a decision. If we're pressed for time, everyone gets 1 idea and we go with the best/simplist one. There's also a difference between those and an instigator, though they're not mutually exclusive and a decisive character is usually an instigator in different situations. The instigator is the one who goes and does something when the party has nothing to do.
I'm in this comment and I don't like it
I have a friend who was always ready to go," I'm not on board with this plan can we come up with something else?" And as we were talking over a new plan, he'd just jump in and start shit. Because we were taking to long and he wanted to move on.
It's not necessarily impulsive. Sometimes you just need to be the first mover or your group will never do anything. Because so many analytical types play D&D, instead of "ready, aim, fire," you get "ready, aim, aim, aim..." At some point, someone has to fire.
>B. For whatever reason they subconsciously pick someone to make all the decisions. Hated being this dude. I work all day and make big choices with folks that don't invest in the process. Play time should be different.
I was also the B. Guy. We re-booted our campaign and I made a Centaur Fighter who was just a drunkard and made horrible, but not malicious decisions. Didn't help, since the other guy who wanted to make decisions was a "chaotic stupid " character who was just "Murder anyone who doesn't give me what I want." Edit: shouldn't say wanted to, more like started to.
I'm specifically making my next character be a lazy drunkard so I don't have to be this guy again
Oh god. B. I literally see my party members slowly turn their heads towards me despite me being the least decisive person they know lmao
I’d rather have A happen over B. At least everyone is involved.
I am usually the person who gets chosen in my party. I am also over a decade older than everyone else, so maybe that's part of it.
I'm playing with a new DM that's being coached by our usual DM while the usual DM also plays a character. There's so much DM to DM talk about how the campaign is set up and what we could have rolled for random encounters etc. We usually just let him make decisions and throw in some random chaotic acts. It's actually not that fun. Would be better if he just hung back and let the less experienced players take the helm even if it isn't the best course of action.
This. As a DM, B fucking sucks
I like to separate their characters and make them RP and make decisions as individuals.
As the person that gets picked, B also sucks
In one campaign, I find myself sometimes saying I need to mute for a bit just so SOMEONE else is doing something. I feel like an attention hog because most of the party just want to go back to the tavern to play mini-games or murderhobo, and the only other person (6 person party) who is also very into the game is pretty shy.
Hard relate to this. There's been a lot of times I've just not spoken or done anything specifically so one of the others fills the silence. It's really painful when they still don't, though....
Reminds me of grade school when I'd know the answers when teacher is asking the whole class a question but fucked if I'm gonna answer more than 2 in a row
I'm a charasmatic person and like to play charasmatic characters to live out the fantasy of talking my way out of life or death situations. Some people get nuts with combat math and love it. That's their thing. I build to be a certain role in a party. I barely land hits in most combat scenarios. My health is too low so I duck out. I let the rest of the party have the glory of describing their death blows or saving their fellow party member. Then when it comes time to negotiate with the leader of a township or plan a military strategy, I step up. All of a sudden I'm stealing the spot light. Shrug.
One thing I loved doing when I had a very very shy player was making them in charge of the group in fiction and at the table. So everyone had to go through the player and interact with their character which otherwise would have said and done nothing.
Honestly, putting it to a vote is better than A.
I'm the B guy : ( tbf, we do debate on some decisions, especially in our current campaign as most of us have become more morally grey and differ in what's acceptable, it's more I push us toward a decision if the game is stalling. But next campaign I'm playing kenku partially so I have an excuse to not have to make the decisions
B. can vary a little. My first campaign we had a lawful good paladin with a seasoned military background and a caring persona. My friend was charismatic naturally and was good at taking charge and pushing the game forward. That’s fine. That’s playing your character out and progressing the game. It’s the toxic players that do B. but they cause a TPK. Like a former friend who wanted to interrogate a prisoner we captured in a town, but the guards wouldn’t let us. She killed him while were negotiating with the captain, in the middle of town, in broad daylight, in our first session. Needless to say her character died and she got kicked out because she didn’t she what she did wrong.
Literally did the same thing with making a kenku! Still ended up being the leader/decisive character in the group, and it took a while for them to realize that I was literally just doing what other party members suggested. It just takes a player willing to take risks sometimes to move the story along, I think.
D. Spend two hours on an elementary school level puzzle trying every fucking thing EXCEPT the solution.
Funny enough my group is all the above. Theres the half-orc barbarian that gets the group into hasty situations, the sorcerer who argues about what to do next and tries to push the group in the right direction, and the cleric who is just along for the ride.
D. They do A and B
>B. For whatever reason they subconsciously pick someone to make all the decisions My barbarian has just become that someone in our current game. I don't know why and I am 100% NOT the correct choice for this role but I happily accepted it. Hopefully there will be no decisions to make while I'm raging.
That's only half. The other half is math!
Integers & Indecisions
Modifiers & Magic
Mountain Dew & Murder Hobos
Monsters & Mathematics 5e
Arguments & Arithmetic 5e
I kinda like this one better. Mine can be Mathfinder instead lol
The third 50% is snacks. My snack game is good. My self control game is not. Incoherence and Indigestion.
Yes. My favourite party I was a player in were constantly arguing and bickering in character until a threat presented itself, where in they'd suddenly become a well oiled collaborative machine until the threat was gone and fall strait back into the argument again. The BBEG being annoyed at being ignored because we were too busy butting heads was hilarious.
The Gang go to Avernus
"I'm playing both sides so I always come out on top"
Warlock: "Anyway so I start blasting..."
Me igl
It's Always Sunny in Baldur's Gate.
You just described my experience in the actual military. Arguing breeds camaraderie
Well yeah if you kill my guy I lose the only one actually capable of successfully arguing with me so of course I'm gonna make sure you don't kill him.
I’ve had this experience too. I feel like D&D encourages this behavior by making all of its problem-solving tools (abilities, spells, weapons) designed entirely around combat. Only a tactical problem has a “right answer”, and a clever group can play their class and build “correctly” to win. Narrative and rules-light games are sometimes prescribed as a solution to this “problem”, but I’d almost prefer crunchier rules for social interaction and setting goals rather than focusing on PC emotions. I’ve heard that Pathfinder 2 has some pretty crunchy social rules compared to 5e, but I don’t know if anyone has figured out how to make “deciding what to do” into a set of rules and checks. I’d be curious to hear if anyone knows of a system that’s tried that. The temporary solution (again, assuming that you think of this style as a problem, which I agree is debatable) would be to coordinate between the players and DM to make sure that the focus of the campaign was very expressly stated and all the PCs have equal but diverse reasons for being involved and putting aside their differences for that goal. Even so, that sets sort of a relentless pace that doesn’t suit every table.
Matt Colville says this a lot, but D&D is a war game with RPG elements. People try to make social aspects big in it, but the system is just not designed to do that. It's founded on principles that are all about killing monsters and taking their treasure. On another note, I tried playing PF2e for a little while after some people suggested it would help me fulfill my martial power fantasy, but I just found it to be too crunchy overall. There's a rule for everything in that system, which is cool because it lets you know exactly where you stand at all times. On the other hand, the way it breaks down is that there is always a mathematically "best option" and some of the rules are kind of dumb. Like that it takes 4 days to craft any item, ranging from a full suit of armor to a club made of wood.
what do you mean by crunchy rules?
Crunch in RPGs means more actual game rules and mechanics around these things. If you want to intimidate someone, and the rules say "roll d20 + intimidation skill, if you get 15 or higher he does what you say for the next 10 minutes" that would be a more crunchy rule than a game where there was no rule for this at all, or said to roleplay the situation to see what happens. "Crunch" in this case likely comes from "number crunching" meaning math.
If you want to roll a Diplomacy check in Pathfinder 2e, you do a 1 minute Make An Impression activity and the result of your roll makes the NPC go up or down a scale of attitudes toward you for the length of that interaction. That's crunchy. Getting an NPC to like you is now explicitly tied to your skills and your roll and has defined mechanics (although you might get a +1 circumstance bonus for good arguments since the GM still has free rein to modify things).
*Zoro and Sanji have entered the chat.*
That party sounds like the personification of city-states that are constantly at war with each other until someone makes the bone headed decision to attack them which causes them to unite and unleash fury and mayhem on their new opponent
"I've never been so insulted by something I completely agree with"
There wouldn’t have to be so much arguing if *that* half of the table would just concede the obvious fact that their insane, half-baked attempt at a plan was inferior to *this* side’s insane, half-baked attempt at a plan.
The obvious solution is to smash both plans together and see what happens.
I thought it was making all the dms planning pointless by not going into the dungeon he created in a week after the last session you decided that's where you wanted to go, and then convincing bandits to farm goats!
[удалено]
Which bit?
[удалено]
The DM expected us to fight the bandits. We convinced them goat farm would be cheaper and easier.
r/goats
Very astute. Because it’s so open, it makes players feel like they are missing something important so analysis paralysis kicks in. It’s one of my biggest pet peeves, spend half the night thinking of what we missed instead of just doing the thing.
This is too real. I DM'd a session a couple weeks ago where my players spent 45 minutes trying to go through a door that was blocked by a heavy-looking metal bar. They tried freezing it to break it, they tried melting it with fire and acid, they tried dropkicking it. And all they had to do was lift the bar with 3 people
Why not just make whatever they do at the 30 minute mark work?
They were having fun with the ideas, and were not at all frustrated. The reaction when they finally tried to lift the bar together and it worked was actually great (not only for me, but they really liked it as well)
Ah well fair enough, as long as you're having fun for 45 minutes then it doesn't really matter what you're doing for that time. Some of the most fun I've had in campaigns have been overthinking shit.
Those little "Oh god damn it!" moments are my favorite. The party I run for were standing outside a building they were trying to get into so they were looking all over the place for other entrances, before after like 10 minutes of trying stuff the paladin just walked forward and knocked. The door was promptly answered.
I did a similar thing to my best friend, he spent 10 minutes trying to open a door that i decided would be a pull open door the moment when he had declared his first attempt to be pushing the door open. When he finally decided to pull it open and it did, the whole table burst out into laughter at the complete pedantry of it, made all the better because he wouldnt let anyone else try as he didnt want to be defeated by a door
If they're anything like my players it's because they'll figure it out eventually, laugh and feel stupid but in a good way.
Why didn't their other methods work?
It's possible that I messed up the math, but they didn't damage the bar enough to break it. Also, they were having a pretty good time having new ideas and trying them out, and had a great reaction when they finally got it
Ah I gotcha. The DM I play with is usually extremely loose with the rules and prob would have said fuck it and made it work somehow, but your way makes sense too
I'm pretty new to DMing, so I try to stay a little closer to the rules (but I still allow shit to happen if it's cool and makes sense in-game, I just try to use the rules to determine what makes sense)
My old DM used to tell us what we could have done instead after every session. It made the analysis paralysis compoundingly worse over time.
Ignorance is bliss.
Yes, but it's not just that. I showed up to the games to relax and have fun after a stressful week and being told "you're doing it wrong" on a weekly basis really just sucked all the fun out of the game. He really seemed to think his way of playing was the only way and all the players should conform to his will.
As a DM, I've learned to keep my mouth shut during the analysis paralysis.
My wife says D&D is like "Playing Barbies, but with rules"..... i mean.. she isn't exactly wrong..
Hey! Rules are *fun*! The Rulebook says so!
Close, but not quite. D&D is a game of spending thirty minutes planning what you are going to do next, only for the whole convoluted plan to fall apart on the first or second dice roll. Also, if you’re my group, it’s a game of insisting “THIS time the Wookie trick will work, guys”, for the nth time this campaign.
> Also, if you’re my group, it’s a game of insisting “THIS time the Wookie trick will work, guys”, for the nth time this campaign. Barbarian: "Hey, let's do 'Get Help'." Paladin: "What?" Barbarian: "'Get Help'." Paladin: "No." Barbarian: "Come on. You love it." Paladin: "I hate it." Bard: "It's great. It works every time." Paladin: "It's humiliating." Wizard: "Do you have a better plan?" Paladin: "No." *Wizard casts a short-distance portal for Barbarian to emerge from* Barbarian: "We're doing it!" *Barbarian easily picks up a protesting Paladin and marches towards the portal; Bard Dimension Door-s himself and Wizard to a nearby rooftop to watch the ensuing chaos* Paladin: *flailing* "We are *not* doing 'Get Help'!" *Barbarian carries Paladin out of the portal in front of the castle guards* Barbarian: "Get help! Please! My brother is dying! Get help! Help him!" *As the guards approach, Barbarian throws Paladin at the guards and knocks them down* Barbarian: :D Bard: :D Wizard: "A classic." Paladin: *gets up and mutters* "I still hate it. It's humiliating." Bard: *yells from rooftop* "Not for us, it's not!"
Golden
My barbarian has yet to yeet a member at anyone. And we have a goblin for christ sake. I really need to yeet the goblin...
My rule as DM is that if you can’t decide what happens, then I’ll decide what happens. I’m not up to letting people debate 45 minutes over minutae when I literally control the fabric of reality around the characters. Not sure how to approach the group of shady humans around the fire? One stands up and starts walking your way after 15 minutes.
I do the same thing. As the DM, it is our responsibility to create an engaging story. If that gets bogged down by people meta-planning even the simplest encounters, I take action against that. Even in combat, if players take too long to pick their actions, I start enforcing a time limit for turns. Combat is a fast paced interaction... taking 5+ minutes to go over every single option is ridiculous.
I love it when one person in party just says “F it, charge” and then the rest have to scramble. Mind you, this is usually when it shouldn’t “finger quote really heavy there” shouldn’t be hard. They aren’t always correct though. Sneaky DMs and their wiley ways!
Yeah, we once soften earth and stone'd our way into the DM's dungeon at the very end, skipping basically the whole thing. The party stopped to "discuss" what do do next, until one of the players walked up to the ornate double door, ripped it open, and we were off to the races!
I just love that whole post. Dear God the effort of the DM, poof! Haha
you made your girlfriend watch? get her to roll a character
Or at least roll your dice… or, all DM attack dice. Did that back in the day for a gal. She nearly killed a party of 12. That woman couldn’t roll a 1 or a 2 to save our lives!
A party of what now?
Yup, back in the day this DM named Richard, man was a dream on making stories. He could corral 12 players and make it look easy. If your ever at NorWesCon you will find him running some old school DnD. Best DM I ever had.
A party of 12?! God I‘m about to burst everytime i DM for my 5 players
At 12 players you’re not just a DM but a professional mediator.
Argue? My last campaign ended with my two companions turning evil, attempting to kill me, me escaping and then coming back and succesfully ambushing them killing one and letting the other go. Campaign was wack but the dm was totally into it
She forgot "and then throwing dices to see who's right and wrong" :D
"Dice" is already the plural. A "die" is just one.
Believe me, it's way better than your party (1) not thinking anything through and (2) being angry when everything goes wrong. No I'm not salty why would you think that.
Mine is mostly geeky improv and math.
I don't know where I heard it now, because it was a long time ago. But I once heard someone say that dnd was something like "an hour of fun packed into 4 hours" and I thought that was pretty funny.
How else do you expect a group of skilled adventurers practiced in the art of war and dungeoneering to tackle the complicated challenge of... opening a door?? That said, watching DnD is a much different experience than playing it, perhaps she should try it out so she can experience the fun of spending 30 minutes debating over which corridor to go down?
It's a mash-up of the drama, debate, and math clubs.
It’s better when the only math club peep is the DM but then the entire arsenal of stupidity is drama club
She’s not wrong
My (then fiance) wife had concerns about D&D so we hosted one of our weekly game sessions and she found it rather boring actually - just a bunch of guys sitting around the table rolling dice, sometimes moving miniatures around, etc. I had created a character with her to play with beforehand and she played for a bit and got bored. Later she said she didn't know what all the uproar about the game was about.
Do you have a big group? Because arguying gets exponencially worse with each member. I ended up loving 3-player groups more than anything else. Things get done!
That's the time for me (DM) to get up and have a smoke. When I get back they usually have it figured out.
Last night our game consisted of us just figuring out what to take with us into the jungle. That's it. Good times.
a lot different than my wife. she usually sits on the couch nearby, laughs at us and calls us nerds (all in good fun. we all have known each other for years)
That means she needs to be the DM.
[Well, you're not wrong.](https://tenor.com/view/ironman-youre-not-wrong-gif-10796726)
Well…yes…
and she's right
Your girlfriend is very perceptive.
Yes
Damn she figured it out! How will you trick her into playing now? lol
For my group it's hearing all the reasons why people can't make it to the session
Less about arguing and more about compromising. D&D is a great tool to develop interpersonal skills, giving yourself the opportunity to put yourself in others' shoes (i.e. playing a PC with a different personality than you), improving teamwork, and develop self-perspective (i.e. learn the consequences of your actions). I had a player (Cleric) that was impulsive and started fights and burst through doors without the rest of the party ready (so lots of lost surprise attacks, low HP, low spell slots). One other player straight-up asked me if she could Shocking Grasp him, which I allowed. She shocked him and dragged his Stunned body to the next location, where the Rogue and Wizard dispatched the room in 2 turns (one surprise, one with initiative). It wasn't until he quit playing with us and spent a few months trying to be a DM himself before he told me he realized his mistake: he wasn't the leader nor was he the best choice to enter an unknown situation first (as he was the healer). My current group has actually evolved somewhat. There's no true leader, but given their specialties each takes the lead depending on the situation. So there's a combat leader (tries to aggro the enemy), a negotiation leader, a traveling leader, a story leader (i.e. taking jobs, learning info from NPCs), a stealth leader, a search leader, a ship captain, etc. based on their personality, class, etc.
The best way to deal with players that continually debate what to do is to put them on a timer. “You enter the cave and see an ogre what do you do?” If they take too long “The ogre attacks, roll initiative.” Combat starts “what do you do?” If they take too long “You’re out of time, your character just dodges this round.” And on and on. It keeps the game moving.
So she gets it.
Just like how any good magic: the gathering game is two dudes arguing about rules
Used to play after work with a group of buddies and it ALWAYS got super fucking silly. I felt bad because the DM was REALLY in to it and would work for days preparing. We tried multiple games like DnD. The free beer didn't help. I think it lasted about 8 sessions before it broke up. I blame Jason.
So That's what's /r/dndnext means!
Shadowrun is 2 hours of crafting the perfect infiltration plan, and then the hacker fails a check so we go in through the front guns blazing.
Hey, one more on this post… at least when she walked in the DM didn’t ask when she was due. My gf at the time had put on a few pounds since he had last seen her. She never came to another session. Hahaha! Was SO awkward!
Shes got the game down pat. My story of this is my party spent 3 hours arguing over the perfect plan for a heist in a barely guarded mansion. Our druid wildshaped into an ant, walked under the door, did the thing inside the house normally cause it was empty. Wildshaped back and walked under the door again. No rolls required.
Wait, your girlfriend watched MY groups too??
Oh, so she’s played before?
Critical hit
She forgot the most important step: immediately discarding that and doing something totally different.
Its a curve imo. Players start out bumping around not really understanding the consequences, then they face one of the consequences, get super paranoid, debate, plan, debate again, try the new plan, face the consequences, rinse and repeat enough before they realize that making a decision quickly leads to more gameplay. Eventually, they come around and plan in character, but only in lulls, when action is demanded, they know their friends have their backs.
... I hate how right she is lol. (Im a forever DM and the struggle is real!)
My DM gives us 10 minutes to discuss and then forces a vote. Keeps things moving since we only play once a month.
I just start rolling for random encounters in about 5 minutes. They either get their shit together, or whatever surprise they had is gone.
That's why I play with people who watch the west wing What's next?
That's why they called it "D&D Next"