2 minutes in and we got Zach foaming out the mouth with bits and tangents LOL YESSIR Once again, we are so back. Happy Monday to all the Bolders! (He can’t hang)
Okay, the scenario around 30:00 was actually insane. Wanting to know enemy locations and trying to ret-con previous decisions made by the characters..... I feel like a retired MMA fighter about to pick the gloves back up.
DM: Your party reaches the door surrounded by riddles, you surmise that these riddles will be the key to unlocking the door ahead. Player 1: Well I personal don't know but my character with 20 intelligence would know. DM: Okay so your character easily opens the door. As you open it you encounter a group of guards who are preparing to attack your party. Player 2: My character has 20 charisma so should be able to calm them down with ease. DM: Okay so your character easily calms down the mob of guards....Well that was a great session see you all next week.
Honestly, your take on the homogeneity of published D&D adventures as compared to the vast variety of Magic the Gathering sets, Secret Lairs, and pop-culture properties is spot on. WOTC tried to follow up on the promise of MtG x D&D with Ravnica and Theros, but they weren’t supported with adventures! They would’ve been perfect fodder for “D&D in different standard settings that we own the IP for” (Urban Fantasy and Mythic Greek Fantasy, respectively). They had in-built restrictions, the most flavorful way to define a setting! Instead of a fantasy noir with guild-pact intrigue and an exploration of the impact of urban sprawl, we got Mindflayers. Instead of an Odyssey, we got MORE MINDFLAYERS. There is a way to do this. We have seen it done by third-party publishers forever. Licensing must be nuts, but WOTC already owns the MtG settings! Give us Phyrexia, let us fight Eldrazi- wait shit THATS MORE MINDFLAYERS! It must be hard being right so often, Mr. Bold. Keep up the great work.
32:42 I think there's a fair middle-ground there. You are not playing as you, but you're roleplaying a character that is better at certain things (usually most things) than you are in real life. It makes sense to give high intelligence/wisdom characters a chance to figure certain things out, even if the player doesn't know it themselves. In my game we have something like a logic check, which allows characters to deduce. Not only does it solve some issues with players misinterpreting certain events and gives opportunities for deepening lore, but it gives them tips when they get stuck. Mind you, it wouldn't allow them to automatically solve an entire puzzle just like that. If you don't want that kind of system, that's understandable, but I find it useful and fun for the players.
If you need to write out a player who has left the group, think about implementing a small side arc of a False Hydra. The group will make up their own reasons why the player left justifying in their head their sudden disappearance, but in fact the player was eaten by a False Hydra. The party doesn't even need to fight the False Hydra, but you have it in your back pocket, so that if they ever go back to the location where the last saw the leaving player, they already have something to do.
16:27 Bro, I was not ready for you to name-drop Cloning Clyde and Grabbed By The Ghoulies. That was a mental flashbang for me. Thank you angry man for the nostalgia
On the topic of resurrection i remind players thst diamonds of that rarity are not only rare already, but hoarded and secreted away because of the power they have . The flip side is I fully endorse reincarnation because of the huge rp implications of it, and its material components are much easier to find.
Zach: having an emotional moment, opening up his soul to strangers and being honest and real about his life Me through fistfuls of Chicago mix: 😡Tell me more angry words about stun
On the topic of resurrection, I let my tables know that death has stakes and resurrection isn't just a clean slate. In the past, I would have the player that is resurrected come back a level lower, or sometimes take away a point from their stat block. Possibly lose the ability to attune to a specific magic item they possessed before dying. Just something to make it seem like it mattered that they died and they are feeling the repercussions of it. I know this probably isn't RAW, but it's generally worked in the past for my tables.
Hearing Zach complain about how Dragons are played out hurt my soul. I fucking love Dragons. It's my greatest weakness as a DM; almost every story beat, plot point, and piece of worldbuilding I homebrew somehow relates back to Dragons. I just think they're neat!
I submitted the story about the players wanting to rely on their characters rather than playing themselves. Glad to see that my stance wasn’t alone, but I think you did a better job articulating how I felt on the inside.
The first module I ran was out of the abyss. I loved it for evoking all the abyssal themes and hit players with consequences for their actions (since they LOVED trying to take on the demon lords)
I super agree with the “enough dragons/mind flayers” take, but I ran an Alien/The Thing inspired low level game that used Illithids as the “alien” and my players loved it
My table's home rule is that whenever someone gets resurrected, they have to reroll death saves. If they succeed, theyre back. If they fail, they're permadead, and only a wish spell can bring them back.
It wouldn't surprise me that WotC avoids distinctly flavoured modules because it will lead people away from their products, and towards more specialised TTRPGs which execute the themes better. They are presumably locked into fantasy themes because that's "THEIR BRAND" and they're trying to keep as many people as possible similarly locked in with them. In regards to handling the mismatch between a good IRL charisma and a bad roll, I'd simply treat it as luck getting in the way of success, kinda like how the meta scenario is. You can make the best speech in the world, but if a pigeon shits on your head, that's all people are going to remember.
Zach the Bowling Pin (Because of the Hat). Anyways, happy to see the rabid flesh monster on my feed again. I never feel more vindicated than when watching your content. You get the rage.
About MTG specifically commander: Love that it sparked such a moment of inspiration, they're the best, but not limited to MTG, consume all sorts of content for that (BTW I'm running low on it, so if anyone has any suggestions I'm open to hear them out). That aside IMO it has potential to be possibly the best form of card game there is, but heavily depends on the people you play with, custom/homebrew rules/cards... you use and on what you want from the game. Sadly I wasn't yet able to play full TTRPG style game with it like i hoped to (and unless you proxy, or play with cards under 5 $ it has potential to be one of the most expensive games there is), but that aside I like it still. D&D modules: Never till now though about it, but would make so much sense, why most of the modules feel kinda generic and bland, while some custom ones go so much further. Licensing nightmare, that might actually be it! (also some of them might be simply just worse, unfinished, made in a too much of a hurry...) (also they're made for mostly general audience so they come up also kinda generic and bland for something that is fantasy (that could be anything...) in comparison to what crazy shenanigans my brain comes up with that just might work...). Much love, take care and bye 😃🥰😇 TLDR: Inspiration can be obtained form anywhere and I'm running low so recommendations for something cool are appreciated. MTG can be nice but also expensive. Licensing might be also one of the reasons modules are kinda bland for fantasy (where anything can happen...).
If resurrection/revivify is a problem in your campaign then that means you're not appropriately limiting your player's resources. I use the shared campaign variant from Xanathar's guide as a reference for this. Even at a glance, that is a significant commitment to your resources to use resurrection even once.
Honestly just look forward to your ramblings. some great points, some questionable BUT it's your opinion and it's very clear. Which makes it very entertaining seeing you put yourself out there and being yourself.
Mining gold in the 50-55 minute mark. Love the reminder. When I tell people about dnd, I say it’s a Shared narrative story that you tell with friends. That’s what it’s all about, not oh we use this rule set and then can level from 1-20 blah blah.
In terms of it not being 5e anymore if you alter the theme/system, around 52:00 I have rebuilt pathfinder and 5e (Because I'm an insane person DM who loves torturing himself) where I removed magic from pathfinder and put in my own magic system that's used through items and any class can use it (I also banned strictly magic classes from play as well). The 5e rework was me adding in my own system for how guns work and having armor reworked to match, as well as a whole slew of "Magic items" that were Fantasy WWII era diesel punk technology. If that's not Pathfinder or 5e anymore, then oh well lmao. My players and I had a ton of fun and it created a much more unique story than whatever LotR rip off I was going to make otherwise. I should also say, what that DM is doing, is pretty close to what Starfinder did with the pathfinder world. Its a great idea and I hope it works out for him.
Hey, man. I like your content, and agree with most of your takes. I honestly think you'd like an open world game, if it was just more balanced in its encouters. And I mean, like, the DM actually puts work into helping shape it all into a story, and adding in fun characters, and roleplay. Its hard to pull off, but worth it.
I completely agree that DnD NEEDS more thematic modules . People usually play their own homebrew campaigns anyway, why would they pay for generic fantasy schlock if they can come up with it on their own? But I would argue in favor of Faerun modules as well. Its a big-ass setting. It so huge. And WotC ignore most of it! Kitchen-sink settings like this can be used to run almost any kind of thematic game. Just gotta lean into local flavour. Also: city Sharn from Eberron. If there's a place for heavily noir-themed game of DnD, its Sharn.
Frankly, I'm not even sure I could bring something wholly original to life anymore and think that some crazy reskinning might be all that's needed for a thing to feel fresh. That and the delivery. Mind flayers as they're can for example feel boring if you just skim them, but if you reskin whole exosystem into their caves, introduce a sense of wonder from the long forgotten technology even they cannot recreate and thread the attention span of all present carefully (not sprinting/skimming through the module in an hour and not slowing down to a total halt for too long). You might just be able to experience something extraordinary... (after that experience... Yeah I think nothing about mindflayers could surprise me anymore and I wouldn't need to see them for quite some time... So lets do the other crazy campaign you got cooking over there started and go as deep as you want...)
MTG might have cracked the code for their game, that being, instead of wholly working on their own lore themselves, they got licenses for other franchises and included them in their products as all the multiverse is connected in the lore so everything is canon... And you could also go as insanely hard as you'd like in the next multiversal one-shot/campaign you play, so go nuts! 😃😇
Revivify feels like just another more advanced healing since it works only 1 min after death, other ones are closer to the craziness that is resurrection...
As someone who also played a lot more D&D before playing MTG I don’t understand why they don’t make modules based on the stories they make for their MTG sets. It’s their content that has a story fleshed into it that would love to play in.
The last story sounds a lot like an action economy problem. A whole group of enemies almost smoked the party, while a single string enemy got smoked due to being wailed on by every player at once. But also yes, CR bad. Try balancing encounters by roughly eyeballing the total of health and damage per round of each side of the fight, I've had great experience with that so far.
As someone wohe loves playing spell casters like Wizard I live the idea of components a good compromise I have seen is using generic spell components or using a magic item like a wand that might negate the need for components but only for spells that dont require a gold cost for their components or arent consumed on cast. Revivify or Simulacrum should not be cast for free unless its a wish spell that casts it.
People who think the game system should be tied to one setting are mental. For me it's all about vibes. Vanilla fantasy can be fun, but you gotta have variety.
17:01 I’ve been running a one piece dnd campaign using 5e mechanics. It’s mainly based on some fan made homebrew to add in all the one piece flavor and has been super fun so far but really wish there was an official module/campaign.
The problem with non physical stats is that this is where the interface between Character and Player overlaps - it‘s fine to solve any physical problem with stats, but you just can’t do the same with mental/social stats - there is no satisfying solution to it, but I agree with Zach: What is the point of the game if you don‘t play it. But I can see how it is unfair too.
Wizards proved with the new DMG that they care more about the IP of Faerun than they do about expanding what DnD can be. They cut back on a ton of advice on how to homebrew and create your own things in favor of giving you lore about Faerun and how to use the established DnD lore to run custom games in the DnD setting. It’s about brand recognition and they realize that a lot of newer players are coming in knowing and caring more about Critical Roles Exandria than about Faerun
Love it when Zach is so lost in the sauce that he angrily reinvents the wheel. Like... limit certain high level spells by giving them material requirements, huh? Mate, that is literally RAW. A spellcasting focus/component pouch replaces all material components EXCEPT ones that have a price listed. You actually need to have those available. And guess what, stuff like Resurrection absolutely has such components.
1:02 oof that one can be dangerous if you're playing with people with low alcohol tolerance. I'm a pretty big guy (6'3, 220 lbs, I bench more than you) and I woke up in a ditch about 45 minutes away from the house we were playing at after 3 games. I would also recommend using something with a nice flavour and 20% alcohol instead of the recommended 40% if you don't want to end up like me after 1 turn
Maybe Check out the MTG campaign setting? The have some interesting guild and faith mechanics (Ravnica and Theroes) as well as other species option. Each has a very strong theme, kinda hits what you were talking about.
One thing I've done with the "shy person playing high CHA/charming person playing low CHA" thing is, in short, that your execution of what you're saying isn't the substance of what you're saying. It's great to voice and RP your character like they would talk within your limits, but if you're silver-tongued but your character is the social equivalent of a dumpster fire and you rolled a 3, your well-made lie only sounded that good in the character's head. If you're shy and fumble even on your best attempt to say it but your 20 CHA bard rolls a nat 20? They said it the way you will in the shower this evening when you inevitably overthink your delivery. As for INT stuff with things like puzzles and lore, your high INT is why you get clues and hints. Your past experience with the fae is why you got to roll to avoid that problem instead of rolling to figure out how to deal with what you stumbled into. Your stats don't make decisions for you.
This is the first of your videos ive watched and all i have to say is, people who complain that the video they are watching is not good or to their liking. Thats on the viewer. Not every TH-camr is for everyone. If you want a genetic podcast there are plenty out there. But if you are a fan of something it should be for the content as it is not how you want it to be.
Hey Zach, you should really look into the GURPS system if you like the variation in themes and mechanics from those themes. It has a wild amount of books and 'dlcs' like you mentioned
Im happy the way it is right now. There are good modules from other sources than wotc and that's the best. Because wotc is too big. They have to play it safe and their adventures are all pretty bad. So wish for more. I would love to see a dark sun setting with some adventures.
I loved the dragonlance novels so much that I wanted to run the 5e adventure. I think it would've been better to replace a campaign setting with a small adventure in it. WOTC seems to have dropped the ball on who should be the bad guy in the adventure module.
I think at the end of the day hasbro doesn't give a shit about the quality of dnd products. They got ahold of the IP and realized it wasn't the cashcow people thought it could be.
The title was part of an ARG dont look too into it
Me when i ARG
That’s hype
2 minutes in and we got Zach foaming out the mouth with bits and tangents LOL YESSIR
Once again, we are so back. Happy Monday to all the Bolders!
(He can’t hang)
Yoooo! Thanks for answering my question about Character deaths and such!!! Can’t wait for the next 100 episodes of this long shelf life podcast.
Okay, the scenario around 30:00 was actually insane. Wanting to know enemy locations and trying to ret-con previous decisions made by the characters..... I feel like a retired MMA fighter about to pick the gloves back up.
Just had to keep you in check with that drink limit
Watching Zach fight for his life at the 30 minute mark was the highlight of my day
DM: Your party reaches the door surrounded by riddles, you surmise that these riddles will be the key to unlocking the door ahead.
Player 1: Well I personal don't know but my character with 20 intelligence would know.
DM: Okay so your character easily opens the door. As you open it you encounter a group of guards who are preparing to attack your party.
Player 2: My character has 20 charisma so should be able to calm them down with ease.
DM: Okay so your character easily calms down the mob of guards....Well that was a great session see you all next week.
we are NOT gonna forget the og title
oh please tell
@@theslayer7134 idk i forgot
@@RongusCongusLMAO
@@RongusCongus 😢
Tradgey strikes
Honestly, your take on the homogeneity of published D&D adventures as compared to the vast variety of Magic the Gathering sets, Secret Lairs, and pop-culture properties is spot on. WOTC tried to follow up on the promise of MtG x D&D with Ravnica and Theros, but they weren’t supported with adventures! They would’ve been perfect fodder for “D&D in different standard settings that we own the IP for” (Urban Fantasy and Mythic Greek Fantasy, respectively). They had in-built restrictions, the most flavorful way to define a setting! Instead of a fantasy noir with guild-pact intrigue and an exploration of the impact of urban sprawl, we got Mindflayers. Instead of an Odyssey, we got MORE MINDFLAYERS.
There is a way to do this. We have seen it done by third-party publishers forever. Licensing must be nuts, but WOTC already owns the MtG settings! Give us Phyrexia, let us fight Eldrazi- wait shit THATS MORE MINDFLAYERS!
It must be hard being right so often, Mr. Bold. Keep up the great work.
32:42 I think there's a fair middle-ground there. You are not playing as you, but you're roleplaying a character that is better at certain things (usually most things) than you are in real life. It makes sense to give high intelligence/wisdom characters a chance to figure certain things out, even if the player doesn't know it themselves. In my game we have something like a logic check, which allows characters to deduce. Not only does it solve some issues with players misinterpreting certain events and gives opportunities for deepening lore, but it gives them tips when they get stuck. Mind you, it wouldn't allow them to automatically solve an entire puzzle just like that. If you don't want that kind of system, that's understandable, but I find it useful and fun for the players.
If you need to write out a player who has left the group, think about implementing a small side arc of a False Hydra. The group will make up their own reasons why the player left justifying in their head their sudden disappearance, but in fact the player was eaten by a False Hydra. The party doesn't even need to fight the False Hydra, but you have it in your back pocket, so that if they ever go back to the location where the last saw the leaving player, they already have something to do.
Except if a player gets eaten by a false hydra they won’t remember them at all
@@WolfgangOSS players aren't their characters
imagine going to a local nightclub your friends hang out in and seeing a false hydra in the bathroom mirror
16:27 Bro, I was not ready for you to name-drop Cloning Clyde and Grabbed By The Ghoulies. That was a mental flashbang for me. Thank you angry man for the nostalgia
On the topic of resurrection i remind players thst diamonds of that rarity are not only rare already, but hoarded and secreted away because of the power they have .
The flip side is I fully endorse reincarnation because of the huge rp implications of it, and its material components are much easier to find.
Killer episode title brother!
What was it?
30:50 This is one of the most legendary crashouts I've ever been witness to. The Looney Toons bomb whistle sound effect started playing in my mind
Zach: having an emotional moment, opening up his soul to strangers and being honest and real about his life
Me through fistfuls of Chicago mix: 😡Tell me more angry words about stun
On the topic of resurrection, I let my tables know that death has stakes and resurrection isn't just a clean slate. In the past, I would have the player that is resurrected come back a level lower, or sometimes take away a point from their stat block. Possibly lose the ability to attune to a specific magic item they possessed before dying. Just something to make it seem like it mattered that they died and they are feeling the repercussions of it. I know this probably isn't RAW, but it's generally worked in the past for my tables.
I have a migraine but I need to see the funny acid splash screamy man
People wanting a shorter intro? Sounds like railroading to me.
Hearing Zach complain about how Dragons are played out hurt my soul. I fucking love Dragons. It's my greatest weakness as a DM; almost every story beat, plot point, and piece of worldbuilding I homebrew somehow relates back to Dragons. I just think they're neat!
31:24 I love when he's SO ANGRY that the claw starts to make an entrance
Love the podcast and the quality is so good
I submitted the story about the players wanting to rely on their characters rather than playing themselves. Glad to see that my stance wasn’t alone, but I think you did a better job articulating how I felt on the inside.
I would legit love an mtg podcast or a section of the podcast where you talk about the game.
Seeing a beginners experience is so fun
That second question had a chokehold on Zach. He was like Finn trying to get over his fear of the ocean.
The first module I ran was out of the abyss. I loved it for evoking all the abyssal themes and hit players with consequences for their actions (since they LOVED trying to take on the demon lords)
She pod on my ep till i 9
Video
Feeding frenzy reference is awesome
I super agree with the “enough dragons/mind flayers” take, but I ran an Alien/The Thing inspired low level game that used Illithids as the “alien” and my players loved it
My table's home rule is that whenever someone gets resurrected, they have to reroll death saves. If they succeed, theyre back. If they fail, they're permadead, and only a wish spell can bring them back.
32:10 Full Demonic Minecraft Pig Person Possession averted.
It wouldn't surprise me that WotC avoids distinctly flavoured modules because it will lead people away from their products, and towards more specialised TTRPGs which execute the themes better. They are presumably locked into fantasy themes because that's "THEIR BRAND" and they're trying to keep as many people as possible similarly locked in with them.
In regards to handling the mismatch between a good IRL charisma and a bad roll, I'd simply treat it as luck getting in the way of success, kinda like how the meta scenario is. You can make the best speech in the world, but if a pigeon shits on your head, that's all people are going to remember.
Zach the Bowling Pin (Because of the Hat). Anyways, happy to see the rabid flesh monster on my feed again. I never feel more vindicated than when watching your content. You get the rage.
TWO DRINK MAX
BAD DM
RAILROAD
METAGAMING
I usually watch these at 2x the speed, but 28:49 - 31:26 had to be slowed down. Way too funny. Hyperventilation sessions - always the best! xD
I can not help but picturing Zach standing up and just yelling "Mindflayer Mindflayer Mindflayer!" while pointing at a WoTC module.
Pop ep 9 wooooo
29:08 and 30:03 As a Dm I FELT that in my very bones
When he said “and that’s not a bold take.” I felt that
About MTG specifically commander: Love that it sparked such a moment of inspiration, they're the best, but not limited to MTG, consume all sorts of content for that (BTW I'm running low on it, so if anyone has any suggestions I'm open to hear them out). That aside IMO it has potential to be possibly the best form of card game there is, but heavily depends on the people you play with, custom/homebrew rules/cards... you use and on what you want from the game. Sadly I wasn't yet able to play full TTRPG style game with it like i hoped to (and unless you proxy, or play with cards under 5 $ it has potential to be one of the most expensive games there is), but that aside I like it still.
D&D modules: Never till now though about it, but would make so much sense, why most of the modules feel kinda generic and bland, while some custom ones go so much further. Licensing nightmare, that might actually be it! (also some of them might be simply just worse, unfinished, made in a too much of a hurry...) (also they're made for mostly general audience so they come up also kinda generic and bland for something that is fantasy (that could be anything...) in comparison to what crazy shenanigans my brain comes up with that just might work...).
Much love, take care and bye 😃🥰😇
TLDR: Inspiration can be obtained form anywhere and I'm running low so recommendations for something cool are appreciated. MTG can be nice but also expensive. Licensing might be also one of the reasons modules are kinda bland for fantasy (where anything can happen...).
Just when i thought i was having the worst Monday, Zach comes back to save it
2:09 "ah uh ah a bookshelf"
Bold, Mr. 2024
I love the intro tangents and stories never change
If resurrection/revivify is a problem in your campaign then that means you're not appropriately limiting your player's resources. I use the shared campaign variant from Xanathar's guide as a reference for this. Even at a glance, that is a significant commitment to your resources to use resurrection even once.
new drinking game: take a shot everytime you can see Zach's molars
TIL that I can use my battlemat if I am ever in need of a sick hat. Thank you for granting us your wisdom once again Mr.Bold.
Absolutely loved the MTG content! Would love to see more of your experience coming into the game. ❤
I love my favorite comedy rage podcast let’s gooo!
Fr tho u are hilarious, I’m a certified dnd watcher only and I still come back to these
Honestly just look forward to your ramblings. some great points, some questionable BUT it's your opinion and it's very clear. Which makes it very entertaining seeing you put yourself out there and being yourself.
🔵 Portal reference. I enjoyed the 🟠
Mining gold in the 50-55 minute mark. Love the reminder. When I tell people about dnd, I say it’s a Shared narrative story that you tell with friends. That’s what it’s all about, not oh we use this rule set and then can level from 1-20 blah blah.
I’m actually at work listening to this😂. Thanks dude keep up the good work.👊
In terms of it not being 5e anymore if you alter the theme/system, around 52:00 I have rebuilt pathfinder and 5e (Because I'm an insane person DM who loves torturing himself) where I removed magic from pathfinder and put in my own magic system that's used through items and any class can use it (I also banned strictly magic classes from play as well). The 5e rework was me adding in my own system for how guns work and having armor reworked to match, as well as a whole slew of "Magic items" that were Fantasy WWII era diesel punk technology.
If that's not Pathfinder or 5e anymore, then oh well lmao. My players and I had a ton of fun and it created a much more unique story than whatever LotR rip off I was going to make otherwise.
I should also say, what that DM is doing, is pretty close to what Starfinder did with the pathfinder world. Its a great idea and I hope it works out for him.
Hey, man. I like your content, and agree with most of your takes. I honestly think you'd like an open world game, if it was just more balanced in its encouters. And I mean, like, the DM actually puts work into helping shape it all into a story, and adding in fun characters, and roleplay. Its hard to pull off, but worth it.
I completely agree that DnD NEEDS more thematic modules . People usually play their own homebrew campaigns anyway, why would they pay for generic fantasy schlock if they can come up with it on their own?
But I would argue in favor of Faerun modules as well. Its a big-ass setting. It so huge. And WotC ignore most of it! Kitchen-sink settings like this can be used to run almost any kind of thematic game. Just gotta lean into local flavour.
Also: city Sharn from Eberron. If there's a place for heavily noir-themed game of DnD, its Sharn.
Frankly, I'm not even sure I could bring something wholly original to life anymore and think that some crazy reskinning might be all that's needed for a thing to feel fresh. That and the delivery. Mind flayers as they're can for example feel boring if you just skim them, but if you reskin whole exosystem into their caves, introduce a sense of wonder from the long forgotten technology even they cannot recreate and thread the attention span of all present carefully (not sprinting/skimming through the module in an hour and not slowing down to a total halt for too long). You might just be able to experience something extraordinary... (after that experience... Yeah I think nothing about mindflayers could surprise me anymore and I wouldn't need to see them for quite some time... So lets do the other crazy campaign you got cooking over there started and go as deep as you want...)
Just as music is the silence between the beats, fun is the tangent between the points.
No one has helped me passively calm down so much while being so angry about something.
Another angry Zach banger
Since you're wearing a shirt and have some content featuring it, I suggest calling your fans, the BeBolders or even HeBolders for the chaos
MTG might have cracked the code for their game, that being, instead of wholly working on their own lore themselves, they got licenses for other franchises and included them in their products as all the multiverse is connected in the lore so everything is canon... And you could also go as insanely hard as you'd like in the next multiversal one-shot/campaign you play, so go nuts! 😃😇
Revivify feels like just another more advanced healing since it works only 1 min after death, other ones are closer to the craziness that is resurrection...
Think problem is with endless bouncing of dying character (give them exhaustion levels and it ceases to be endless and without consequences...)
more intense support of different settings would be sick. A less sexually-explicit Dark Sun remaster would be badass
As someone who also played a lot more D&D before playing MTG I don’t understand why they don’t make modules based on the stories they make for their MTG sets. It’s their content that has a story fleshed into it that would love to play in.
Love your podcast man, keep up the great work!
WotC should collaborate with Fromsoft and give us a gritty soulslike experience.
The last story sounds a lot like an action economy problem. A whole group of enemies almost smoked the party, while a single string enemy got smoked due to being wailed on by every player at once.
But also yes, CR bad. Try balancing encounters by roughly eyeballing the total of health and damage per round of each side of the fight, I've had great experience with that so far.
He sounds so much like the Joker when he speaks quieter.
As someone wohe loves playing spell casters like Wizard I live the idea of components a good compromise I have seen is using generic spell components or using a magic item like a wand that might negate the need for components but only for spells that dont require a gold cost for their components or arent consumed on cast. Revivify or Simulacrum should not be cast for free unless its a wish spell that casts it.
People who think the game system should be tied to one setting are mental. For me it's all about vibes. Vanilla fantasy can be fun, but you gotta have variety.
17:01 I’ve been running a one piece dnd campaign using 5e mechanics. It’s mainly based on some fan made homebrew to add in all the one piece flavor and has been super fun so far but really wish there was an official module/campaign.
The problem with non physical stats is that this is where the interface between Character and Player overlaps - it‘s fine to solve any physical problem with stats, but you just can’t do the same with mental/social stats - there is no satisfying solution to it, but I agree with Zach: What is the point of the game if you don‘t play it. But I can see how it is unfair too.
I suspect everything is mind flayers right now to ride the coattails of BG3.
29:00 so that player just admitted that their real life intelligence is their dump stat💀
Wizards proved with the new DMG that they care more about the IP of Faerun than they do about expanding what DnD can be. They cut back on a ton of advice on how to homebrew and create your own things in favor of giving you lore about Faerun and how to use the established DnD lore to run custom games in the DnD setting. It’s about brand recognition and they realize that a lot of newer players are coming in knowing and caring more about Critical Roles Exandria than about Faerun
Hmm... I don't know Zach. Not enough intro in this episode I think.
Love it when Zach is so lost in the sauce that he angrily reinvents the wheel. Like... limit certain high level spells by giving them material requirements, huh?
Mate, that is literally RAW. A spellcasting focus/component pouch replaces all material components EXCEPT ones that have a price listed. You actually need to have those available. And guess what, stuff like Resurrection absolutely has such components.
1:02 oof that one can be dangerous if you're playing with people with low alcohol tolerance. I'm a pretty big guy (6'3, 220 lbs, I bench more than you) and I woke up in a ditch about 45 minutes away from the house we were playing at after 3 games.
I would also recommend using something with a nice flavour and 20% alcohol instead of the recommended 40% if you don't want to end up like me after 1 turn
Maybe Check out the MTG campaign setting? The have some interesting guild and faith mechanics (Ravnica and Theroes) as well as other species option. Each has a very strong theme, kinda hits what you were talking about.
Feeding Frenzy reference thats how I know ur Zach the GOAT 🐐
Bro keeps getting "one guy'd" every episode lmao
I think its telling that my favorite post action story is all gaurdsman party.
Looooove the podcast SO MUCH!! Do you think you’ll ever do another video about your first ever campaign??
One thing I've done with the "shy person playing high CHA/charming person playing low CHA" thing is, in short, that your execution of what you're saying isn't the substance of what you're saying. It's great to voice and RP your character like they would talk within your limits, but if you're silver-tongued but your character is the social equivalent of a dumpster fire and you rolled a 3, your well-made lie only sounded that good in the character's head. If you're shy and fumble even on your best attempt to say it but your 20 CHA bard rolls a nat 20? They said it the way you will in the shower this evening when you inevitably overthink your delivery.
As for INT stuff with things like puzzles and lore, your high INT is why you get clues and hints. Your past experience with the fae is why you got to roll to avoid that problem instead of rolling to figure out how to deal with what you stumbled into. Your stats don't make decisions for you.
42:36 Sanderson mentioned let’s gooooo!!! #BridgeFour
What a title
What was it?
rip the title
This is the first of your videos ive watched and all i have to say is, people who complain that the video they are watching is not good or to their liking. Thats on the viewer. Not every TH-camr is for everyone. If you want a genetic podcast there are plenty out there. But if you are a fan of something it should be for the content as it is not how you want it to be.
Hey Zach, you should really look into the GURPS system if you like the variation in themes and mechanics from those themes. It has a wild amount of books and 'dlcs' like you mentioned
Im happy the way it is right now. There are good modules from other sources than wotc and that's the best. Because wotc is too big. They have to play it safe and their adventures are all pretty bad. So wish for more. I would love to see a dark sun setting with some adventures.
I loved the dragonlance novels so much that I wanted to run the 5e adventure. I think it would've been better to replace a campaign setting with a small adventure in it. WOTC seems to have dropped the ball on who should be the bad guy in the adventure module.
I think at the end of the day hasbro doesn't give a shit about the quality of dnd products. They got ahold of the IP and realized it wasn't the cashcow people thought it could be.
Pod Ep 9 Video was beautiful.
crashed out before 3 minutes, you,ve changed man...😔
Personally I think the openings are to short, can we get more gasps and rambling stories to complain about. 😂 love the podcast never change.
Nice intro! 😂
🔥 episode!
not helping fight off the unc allegations with that feeding frenzy reference
Did you forget to title this?
Nope wrong
i would totally watch more magic or gaming content
55:43 Its not a Bold Take, it's a Ronaldo Reminder.