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I use STO. Done and done. It’s just too trivial to sacrifice some much precious flow for “realism”

🥳🫂👍🏿 Thank you for sharing - I’m on a quest to collect every house rule on TH-cam and beyond - I’d love to hear about any others you use ❤ Currently, the playlist has 2,287 videos

Funnily enough. I found you while looking at the new monster stat blocks The Dungeon Coach just unveiled for his TTRPG. I just learned who he was a couple weeks ago and it's nice to know he's been at this and recognized. Thanks for the great video.

The difference in AC and HP from a 4e Gnoll to a 5e Gnoll alone are ASTRONOMICAL! What happened?? I play 5e & am trying to start DMing but the problem I keep running into is how to build balanced encounters without just making the monsters into "bags of HP" like you said. Even with circumstantial advantages and the element of surprise, something like a Giant Spider is no more dangerous than a real-world cockroach to just a small Lv3 party in 5e!

hey! this video actually had a lot of good ideas however it does kinda only work locally (not on vtts and the like) still! a lot better than half the initiative related videos on youtube atm ngl

5e isnt any better than making your own game. A game being fixable is like marvelling over how good a burlap sack is as clothes

Given the age of this I'm hoping you have a document with the crit options you gave players.

Excellent arguments !

By the content of TH-cam, everyone is playing high level games.

This sounded like a really great session! Looking forward to when next we meet our heroes. Thanks as always!

It's great to see you back Nick. Thanks for sharing as always!

Kind of sounds like you find a thing that you’ve just started doing difficult.

Nice content!

I like high level play but it takes a lot more prep time.

My main problem with power creep is that it makes it difficult for the DM to plan encounters and challenges when *some* players are playing the old "weaker" subclasses and others are playing the "power creeped" ones.

Here's a thought, make your planar threatening Uber threat something that drains magic out of existence the closer the players get to it the less they can heal themselves the less effective their magical weaponry is is the magic is drained out of it the harder it is to cast spells maybe some spells don't work anymore or work differently. This is balanced by the fact that the monsters are in the same environment and they're similarly limited. This brings things back to a more competitive level that scales better. Also with healing limited there's a real chance of dying and that's an edge that makes any game exciting and fun.

I am currently in the process of ending a 3 year campaign where all my players are 19th-20th level. I find it boring and uninspiring to run. The Fifth Edition Dungeon and Dragons rule, like nearly all game rules, has it's fatal flaw when you reach the higher levels of characters and adventures. It is of course, only my opinion, but I will do as I have done, now that I have played with 5e rules for over three years now, tailor the rules to my taste. There is nothing special about rules that they can not be modified or even ignored, as long as all your players know and understand the changes.

Nice topic and thanks for sharing the chart! Have you taken a look at Forbidden Lands? There's some great inspiration for overland travel as well.

Yes. High level dnd is pretty damn awful. It can work, but you have to fuck with stuff and really finagle your rules/combat encounters to keep things interesting. High levels in dnd have always been bad.

Was the negotiation an opportunity to have one of the PCs play Ellie's part, either one or collaboratively? If not what are the pitfalls of doing that? Cheers!

Man it is so hard to juggle storytelling with other people at the table. I try to make sure any threads I give out aren’t left hanging, but there’s nothing I can do when the players don’t pull. Chekhov’s gun and all that.

Entertainment value. Check. ;-)

Ooh, I love Vutharvyth's design!

I feel all of this! I want to love 5E, but they screw the DM and the players get to have a ton of fun. 4e monsters are all about doing so much at all the time. 5e... After a certain level I just make monsters myself.

I like your channel, your delivery is very watchable or easy to listen to when it’s just audio. I was wondering what your thoughts on systems were? I’ve DM’d since 1979 and have completely switched back to more rules light old school stuff after many years of 3.5, pathfinder and 5e. it’s really rejuvenated my creativity and we’re having a blast. Hope you Keep making content

Great advice - we all sometimes have to learn a lesson more than once. No one should feel bad if that happens.

Frickin' gnolls! ;-)

Sorry to be late catching up with this but I, for one, welcome our new WLWLOH overlords. 👍

Sounds like a good session! I love when my players just sit there and roleplay. The deeper their connection the deeper the drama! I totally agree with the idea that a good session ends on a cliffhanger. Gotta keep your players thinking about what comes next until the next session!

I'm excited for this series! I was brought to this channel from MCDM, and I loved Matt's campaign diaries. I watched all your previous campaign diaries, and can't get enough!

Keep doing great things bud!

He’s back

There we go Nick!

I absolutely love gnolls! I am super excited to hear more about the campaign!

Excited about the new series Nick!

>admit you have zero experience really running a high level campaign >"high level is pointless" bruh are you serious lol

Hey Nick (in front of everyone) this is great advice and I enjoy the way you deliver these tips. Keep doing that! 👍

Good points Rewarding players at the table could help to

The D&D 4th Edition has Encounter Level and Experience Budgets, see page 56 of the DMG. This is the same non-sense as 5e monster and encounter building that had been going on since version 3. You are right that 5e monsters are boring compared to 4e monsters. You are right about the guidance around encounter creation from 4e being more detailed than 5e encounter design.

Monsters in 5e can be characters too so… I think 3.5 did a decent job on monsters

I ran an impromptu game for family last night with no prep, using the starter set and I only needed 4 pieces of information from the goblin stat block to run the fight. AC, HP, attack bonus, damage. I didn't use anything else from their stat blocks, so (unsurprisingly) I am firmly in the 4e monster design was better camp. I don't want monsters that are built like players. I don't need the majority of the information on a monster stat block. Just give me the bare minimum and then what cool stuff they can do!

Always wanted to try 4th edition. I've heard it is good for inspiration

I loved the way 4e handled "attacks". Colville has a great video on adding cool abilities to your monsters from 4e.

For me as a DM, 5th Level is the sweet Spot. The Characters are good at what they are doing, but not so crazy good that other characters can't compete in their field of expertise. The Bard is the best at persuasion, yes, but not so crazy good that it would be all but madness to let the fighter talk. They unlocked 3rd Level spell slots (Fireball!) 2nd Attacks and other stuff and are eager to test it. It stays fun for the next few levels, but 10+ is where the fun exponentially drop. It starts slowly, but it comes more apparent, players get the right tools for the right jobs. Survival session, where you should manage your ressources? Create Food and water. Neat A Canyon-Maze With dangers lurking? Flying steed. Neat This door is magically sealed and needs 3 Keys to open. Dispell Magic. Neat... I need to create a little tension, so i have to exhaust their ressources a little... well, that for i need crazy monsters and lots of them. My gripe is with the ammount of "cheap" solutions PC's get to solve a situation. Nobody remembers the 5th Time when the druid called giant eagles to bring them over the cliff, while the wizard fly'ed everyone else across... BUT that one time, where they had to figure out how to get a rope to the other side, so they could climb over it, but the Goliath slipped against all odds, but was catched by the Wizards Feather Fall, only to land down in the Ravine, where the Druid had to transform into a water-beast to save him, was happy to have choosen moon druid, when all the party came together to solve that issue... That was awesome! Nobody remembered the cursed forests, because they teleported past it... But when they had to travel the deep dark caves of a former Dwarven colony, where they slowly puzzled together what happened here, following clues, fighting monsters inside, just to nearly pass an important skillcheck to know what was coming, had time to prepare and after the big battle it felt like they just won because they were investigative enough, everybody gave everyone else a pat on the shoulder, grinned at me like "Yeah, gotcha!" and i smiled and nodded (Of course i adjusted it to their roleplay, put value in things they found awesome and left out things they showed little interest)... They still remember that one. So... let them play out their power-fantasy? Sure, fun at first, but boring pretty fast when nothing can challenge them any more... "Why is everything immune to my stuff?" "Because your stuff takes away all the tension i could build up" also seems like cheap answear "We never do investigation!" "Well, your bard has +12 on all his social-skills. Either he has no problem at all with the DC's, or the rest of you is just there to watch the show" "Fights are booring and take too long!" "Well... you are the ones, summuning 3+ creatures additionally into the fight...?" Maybe my games are just to low-level? Yeah... but what should i do? have random high-level mages roam the forests to dispell their tiny hut and make things a threat again? Let them constantly roam hostile planes, where rules are out of the window, stuff doesn't work like expected and basically artificially screw them? Give all my monsters legendary actions and legendary resistances, so the safe-or-suck spells don't solve an encounter in 1-2 Rounds? Have nothing normal ever roam around any more, because it wouldn't be a threat to the PC and i need to deplete their ressources a little? Should i just homebrew stuff out of their characters, or take the bullshit route "Yeah, it says so in your ability description, but i am the DM, and i want to play that 4 hours prepared thing now, so no" The only solution i found was to end the Campaigns around that level, maybe let them spike a little for the last encounter, and then start a new campaign. This could totally be my lack of imagination of course, but what i (and most of the time my players) enjoy the most is when they have little, but make a lot out of it. When they pull together their limited ressources, and with cool (or crazy) ideas, come up with a solution that sometimes even surprises me. of course, i nag a little about their plan, bring unforseen consequences, but those situations tend to be memorable. Where RP and good ideas make a situation. Where the group shines and acomplishes something against all odds. Or... rember the 5th time polymorph made a huge enemy into a small one and we put him yet into another jar and sunk him somewhere? Me neither, the first time was cool though.

The power creep started with Xanathar's guide

All my favourite sessions as a DM have been 1-on-1 adventures. Spending all that time with one player and their character is so great for understanding the deeper levels of their characters.

Hey hey, welcome back welcome back! I love this concept. I've been very hungry for some DnD and would most likely play or DM for a group of 3, so this sounds like a perfect option for some pre-game character development and exploration. I know Matt Colville has done a video about one-on-one downtime sessions with his players. Do you do anything similar?

Welcome back!

to be fair, if you havent done lots of high level play then itll be harder to improve on.

Problem - high level play because players level up and become too powerful Solution - level them up faster