Fighting Montages. I use this when it is obvious, that my players outmaneuvered my monsters and will just pick them off in a few turns. Which is rather boring. So i cut it short and give my players a cool action-movie-style fight sequence, where each player narrates what they wanna do. No rolls required and i put on some epic music, to set the scene. My players love it. I also sometimes use it for high stackes fights, when they reduced the enemy to 0 HP. Everyone has fun and gets the satisfaction of defeating the badguys, instead if just one player finishing them off. Works well in large groups where it is harder for the individual to get a moment to shine, especially the shy/quiet ones.
I have a DM who loves to do thid and handwave a combat finishing, he'll do it with story moments too where he just wants to get through the situation and hit the outcome he wants. Both drive me crazy. I WANT to finish the combat, I enjoy the social interactions too
I really like using the monster's Dexterity score for static initiative. My quicklings go on 23 and my zombies go on 6 instead of both going on the same number.
I’ve started using static initiative based on the monster’s passive dexterity modifier. So if a monster’s dexterity mod is +3, their initiative is 13, sweet. To me, it makes for faster initiative tracking and there is a little bit of variance of where the players are going to land during combat.
Excellent tricks! I'm a fan of having all similar monsters go on the same initiative score (which I think is actually the standard written rules for DND 5e). i.e. A fight with skeletons and stirges would have all skeletons act on initiative 15, all stirges on 10.
I like the idea that the player and PC might share responsibilities: treasurer, note-taker, and cartographer are all both IC and OOC roles. Obviously, this won't always work with every group, and maybe not all three roles will be filled, but it could lead to interesting RP moments.
Because of Forge of Foes when im creating a homebrew monsters I use the Monster Statistics by CR table as a skeleton before tweaking the damage for different styles of attacks and its been a game changer
The Caller role works well when you have side-based initiative, ie, the players and the monsters. What I do every round is I have the players designate a roll and the monsters roll, and whoever wins goes first. Then, I set my five minute hourglass (a gift from my players) and let the players hash out their strategy for the turn. Then when the time runs out, I ask the caller to say what everybody’s doing. Usually, I tap the person who is already an optimizer to be the caller role, it’s a natural fit. One other method I do for combat is that I have enemies targeted by the player go on their turn-if you attack a goblin, the goblin attacks back or reacts as if it were their turn. Then, anybody else who wasn’t attacked goes. This way I get the flow of combat, I roll dice with the player and get them engaged, and the combat feels more immersive.
We have a quartermaster and notewriter since players naturally slipped into those roles, and sometimes I give map to them to draw. Keeps things fast and smooth! I haven't tried initiative yet, might be tricky since I'll use static monster initiative now
Nice tricks! I use the monster stats from FoF and luck points and they've been working great! I haven't used several of the others, such as having a player track initiative, because the VTT that I use takes care of that for us. Another like that is taking highest initiative and then going around the table. There's no literal table to go around in a VTT so just using initiative order works great...especially as ShadowDark has it, keeping the order even outside of combat so finding out what everyone is doing stays orderly. But there are a couple of tricks you threw in there that I'll have to try out. One thing I wanted to throw out there is that, rather than 10, 15, 20 for DCs, I really like ShadowDark's DC distribution of 9, 12, 15, 18. You get a little more granularity without adding much complication. I also don't bother with a skill check when the DC would be below 9. I always love your videos.
In my Games I never Roll dice or track damage. I always have one more experienced player track delt damage for me and at the end of each turn this player just tells me things like "and after this attack the dragon is at X damage" afterwards I describe how this looks in the narrative or give the classic "how do you finish this to let the player of the PC who delt damage take it from there. If a monster attacks a player I describe the sense for example: "and after you struck his companion down the other troll turns around and swings his claws at you. +7 to hit " and a player rolls. Do it for a while now this way. I just have a small booklet with notes and my phone with pictures and saved Statt-Blocks. No dice and no screen needed. And all the players I play with like it.
honestly, most of the isues i have are not "lazy ticks" and cant be fixed with easy things but this is a list of things i tend to do: 1) MAKE EVERYONE DM A SHORT ADVENTURE ( its really distinct to play with players who had experienced the effort of being a DM) 2) pre define tropes and cliches that the PARTY will follow (yea, sounds lame, but at session 0 define any tropes or cliches that you want as characters or as groups) so, for example, lest give 3 PC group, a wizard, a barbarian and a rogue: the barbarian wants to be reckles, the rogue wants to lose his mind for gold and its greedy and the wizard wants to be a very plan oriented character. so LETS TALK as group how is this kind of situation is going to be handled in a way that everyone could enjoy their character before we even encounter the situation THAT IS GOING TO HAPPEN. so how each group could do their own rules, and agreements to decide how is this going to be handled, each one does whatever they want? we use a game mechanic to decide?, whenever the group decided, once its decided, players do not get mad at other players :P because it was agreed in advance 3) player roles, extend to outside game: who is bringing snacks (and what kind snacks) who would "push" for attendance and coordinate dates, etc. :P 4) use narrative simplified combat endings :P
Great videeo! Love the dirty tricks and tips. However, I tried the Luck mechanic from ToV and got a lot of complaints from spellcasters whose magic primarily generated saving throw requirements from opponents rather than made atrack rolls or saving throws themselves. Anyone used a tweak to Luck to get around this issue? I also had some players say that they didn't like keeping track of the Luck points and that having/ not having Inspiration was much easier. Again, anyone dealt with this? Thanks.
One idea I used for points that people don't want to track is poker chips or similar tokens. People who don't like math still enjoy receiving and using physical items along with the benefits that come with and tracking is easily seen by all at the table.
As for the spell casters, letting them add the points to their spell DC (which is same as subtracting from the enemy's die) seems like an easy fix but might be too powerful so maybe put limits on it.
Maybe I should try it first before judging, but I don't like putting all the enemies on initiative 12. I feel like your "swingy initiative" example only matters for the *first* round, while having all enemies on 12 ensures that they can all focus on one target *every* round, without any player being able to go in between.
Love your content. I am going to add the forge of foes stats to a panel on my dm screen. Just what applies for the level of players, but still... Is there a Lazy DM DM screen pdf available? Edit:Just realized that, in my notes, I only need to give the name, reference the relevant block and add two flavour words for type of damage, one or two strikes/spells, and maybe a vague and evocative adjective/adverb or two. Literally 10 words for each monster. Why haven't been doing this?
Hell I have a roll that one of my players does for me. One of my player puts condition rings on players for me. He also reminds me of when a spell is concentration. So if the player gets hit I make them roll to see if they are still concentrating
Fighting Montages.
I use this when it is obvious, that my players outmaneuvered my monsters and will just pick them off in a few turns. Which is rather boring.
So i cut it short and give my players a cool action-movie-style fight sequence, where each player narrates what they wanna do. No rolls required and i put on some epic music, to set the scene. My players love it.
I also sometimes use it for high stackes fights, when they reduced the enemy to 0 HP. Everyone has fun and gets the satisfaction of defeating the badguys, instead if just one player finishing them off. Works well in large groups where it is harder for the individual to get a moment to shine, especially the shy/quiet ones.
This sounds fun!
I have a DM who loves to do thid and handwave a combat finishing, he'll do it with story moments too where he just wants to get through the situation and hit the outcome he wants.
Both drive me crazy. I WANT to finish the combat, I enjoy the social interactions too
I’ve been doing static initiative for a while. I do 10 plus dex. Two baddies 13/7 plus dex. Three, 13/10/7 plus dex. Etc
I'll have to change 'Heroic spark' to 'Shady spark'
DM: "You see a motherfucker who looks suspicious as fuck."
Players: "This is my new best friend."
I really like using the monster's Dexterity score for static initiative. My quicklings go on 23 and my zombies go on 6 instead of both going on the same number.
Regarding "Tell players what's going on," you can just do this through a trusted NPC/patron or even a villain monologue. :)
Man, the Heroic Spark is so simple and effective! Love it!!
Love the subtract 3 and add 1d6 rule, haven't heard that before!
I’ve started using static initiative based on the monster’s passive dexterity modifier. So if a monster’s dexterity mod is +3, their initiative is 13, sweet. To me, it makes for faster initiative tracking and there is a little bit of variance of where the players are going to land during combat.
So many great ideas in this one!
Excellent tricks! I'm a fan of having all similar monsters go on the same initiative score (which I think is actually the standard written rules for DND 5e). i.e. A fight with skeletons and stirges would have all skeletons act on initiative 15, all stirges on 10.
I like the idea that the player and PC might share responsibilities: treasurer, note-taker, and cartographer are all both IC and OOC roles. Obviously, this won't always work with every group, and maybe not all three roles will be filled, but it could lead to interesting RP moments.
This is all awesome, as usual.
Could you put this list out in your newsletter for a handy reminder we can print out?
Because of Forge of Foes when im creating a homebrew monsters I use the Monster Statistics by CR table as a skeleton before tweaking the damage for different styles of attacks and its been a game changer
The Caller role works well when you have side-based initiative, ie, the players and the monsters. What I do every round is I have the players designate a roll and the monsters roll, and whoever wins goes first. Then, I set my five minute hourglass (a gift from my players) and let the players hash out their strategy for the turn. Then when the time runs out, I ask the caller to say what everybody’s doing. Usually, I tap the person who is already an optimizer to be the caller role, it’s a natural fit.
One other method I do for combat is that I have enemies targeted by the player go on their turn-if you attack a goblin, the goblin attacks back or reacts as if it were their turn. Then, anybody else who wasn’t attacked goes. This way I get the flow of combat, I roll dice with the player and get them engaged, and the combat feels more immersive.
We have a quartermaster and notewriter since players naturally slipped into those roles, and sometimes I give map to them to draw. Keeps things fast and smooth! I haven't tried initiative yet, might be tricky since I'll use static monster initiative now
Thanks! These will help!
Nice tricks! I use the monster stats from FoF and luck points and they've been working great! I haven't used several of the others, such as having a player track initiative, because the VTT that I use takes care of that for us. Another like that is taking highest initiative and then going around the table. There's no literal table to go around in a VTT so just using initiative order works great...especially as ShadowDark has it, keeping the order even outside of combat so finding out what everyone is doing stays orderly. But there are a couple of tricks you threw in there that I'll have to try out.
One thing I wanted to throw out there is that, rather than 10, 15, 20 for DCs, I really like ShadowDark's DC distribution of 9, 12, 15, 18. You get a little more granularity without adding much complication. I also don't bother with a skill check when the DC would be below 9.
I always love your videos.
In my Games I never Roll dice or track damage.
I always have one more experienced player track delt damage for me and at the end of each turn this player just tells me things like "and after this attack the dragon is at X damage" afterwards I describe how this looks in the narrative or give the classic "how do you finish this to let the player of the PC who delt damage take it from there.
If a monster attacks a player I describe the sense for example: "and after you struck his companion down the other troll turns around and swings his claws at you. +7 to hit " and a player rolls.
Do it for a while now this way.
I just have a small booklet with notes and my phone with pictures and saved Statt-Blocks.
No dice and no screen needed.
And all the players I play with like it.
honestly, most of the isues i have are not "lazy ticks" and cant be fixed with easy things but this is a list of things i tend to do:
1) MAKE EVERYONE DM A SHORT ADVENTURE ( its really distinct to play with players who had experienced the effort of being a DM)
2) pre define tropes and cliches that the PARTY will follow (yea, sounds lame, but at session 0 define any tropes or cliches that you want as characters or as groups) so,
for example, lest give 3 PC group, a wizard, a barbarian and a rogue: the barbarian wants to be reckles, the rogue wants to lose his mind for gold and its greedy and the wizard wants to be a very plan oriented character. so LETS TALK as group how is this kind of situation is going to be handled in a way that everyone could enjoy their character before we even encounter the situation THAT IS GOING TO HAPPEN. so how each group could do their own rules, and agreements to decide how is this going to be handled, each one does whatever they want? we use a game mechanic to decide?, whenever the group decided, once its decided, players do not get mad at other players :P because it was agreed in advance
3) player roles, extend to outside game: who is bringing snacks (and what kind snacks) who would "push" for attendance and coordinate dates, etc. :P
4) use narrative simplified combat endings :P
Great videeo! Love the dirty tricks and tips. However, I tried the Luck mechanic from ToV and got a lot of complaints from spellcasters whose magic primarily generated saving throw requirements from opponents rather than made atrack rolls or saving throws themselves. Anyone used a tweak to Luck to get around this issue? I also had some players say that they didn't like keeping track of the Luck points and that having/ not having Inspiration was much easier. Again, anyone dealt with this? Thanks.
One idea I used for points that people don't want to track is poker chips or similar tokens. People who don't like math still enjoy receiving and using physical items along with the benefits that come with and tracking is easily seen by all at the table.
As for the spell casters, letting them add the points to their spell DC (which is same as subtracting from the enemy's die) seems like an easy fix but might be too powerful so maybe put limits on it.
@vampirelogan Interesting idea. I'll put it into practice and see how it turns out in-game. Thanks for the responses; much appreciated.
Maybe I should try it first before judging, but I don't like putting all the enemies on initiative 12.
I feel like your "swingy initiative" example only matters for the *first* round, while having all enemies on 12 ensures that they can all focus on one target *every* round, without any player being able to go in between.
Love your content. I am going to add the forge of foes stats to a panel on my dm screen. Just what applies for the level of players, but still...
Is there a Lazy DM DM screen pdf available?
Edit:Just realized that, in my notes, I only need to give the name, reference the relevant block and add two flavour words for type of damage, one or two strikes/spells, and maybe a vague and evocative adjective/adverb or two. Literally 10 words for each monster. Why haven't been doing this?
Hell I have a roll that one of my players does for me. One of my player puts condition rings on players for me. He also reminds me of when a spell is concentration. So if the player gets hit I make them roll to see if they are still concentrating
The Luck System was basically stolen from DM Scotty's EZD6.