A human sailor who had a boat that cod shrink when he wanted so it could go in his pocket, and it grew when it came into contact with water. A barrel of laughs when it rained.
I just recently made my first-ever RPG character for the REUP Star Wars RPG. He's a heavily physical combat-oriented Barabel who distrusts most technology that I gave motivations to move prospective plots forward.
My favorite character was a robot that was a walking death machine. Every point was put into being able to snipe a fly from a mile away. So naturally I made him a pacifist who loved helping out his team with his almost zero stats messing everything up.
Hey, I love this trend of tabletop games, especially whenever you talk about non-D&D games. I would absolutely love this to just become its own series.
Back in the early days they stated that they like to use Extra Credits to explore games in general, not just video games or board games. Now that Dan is gone it might change, but overall I think this approach is better.
Well heres what I got from this video on designing the character sheet. 1 make important things bold and easy to find. Move less important ideas to the side. So all core mechanics in bold or in a bold border and easy to see. And variant mechanics or optional ones on the side or a separate page.
I'd consider this inaccurate advice. plenty of players will put a bunch of points into skills for dealing with traps exactly so they don't have to deal with traps. talking with players is the best way of finding out what they vant
To add to this, players putting points into a given stat, ability, or skill doesn't necessarily mean they want to see that thing happen often in the game; it could be a sign that they think YOU (the DM) have a tendency to use the given stat/ability/ or skill in your scenarios and stories. Definitely do some introspection before taking this video's advice to heart.
Agreed on both counts. Looking over where a player invested lots of character resources can help suggest areas to discuss with them (just as important are places with no/few resources spent, when you would expect to see more for that character/class/player/campaign/etc.), but there's really no substitute for having a quick talk to ensure everyone's on the same page.
Wouldn't this, warding off against the GM, be a sign of bad previous experiences? And why even bother GMing to people who would think like that? That said, it's up to the GM to assuage those fears from the get go. "Hey, people, this is not a 'gotcha, you're dead' game. Just tell me what you want to play and we'll try to work with that." How hard can it be to get a group worth playing with to cooperate?
I was about to say similar. When I pick up skills for my characters, it's not only about what I want the character to do but rather making sure the character does survive from whatever the game master throws at them. This is especially true in combative systems in which there is a fear of letting the party down if your character is poorly prepared, pressuring players to invest points for the rainy day. Other words: Making my warrior a tough fighter mostly equals with that I want to be useful for the party, not that I'm not into any dramatic conversations. I just didn't invest to it because the party already has smooth talkers and they needed someone tough to keep monsters away from them. I do consider this advice as a novel, interesting approach though. It probably works better in campaigns in which the games does not resemble a game of chess and there is more room for creative encounters and solutions, giving the players actual freedom to create whatever they want. However, like in all role-playing, communication between the players and the game master is priceless.
Definitely agree on your second point especially. I as a 5E player was conditioned to put a lot of points into perception, since my first GM called a check for it every twenty minutes or so.
This video gives me a lot of nostalgia. My old role playing days, I never really thought about it but I spent hours on my character sheets, they were probably my favorite part of the game, I think I still have a bunch somewhere in my house, some of those characters were more real to me than people in real life.
As someone who is actively designing a tabletop RPG, I am loving the recent videos that focus on more concepts surrounding tabletop games. Thank you for this. When we were designing our character sheets (which still needs improvements), the ability to find information quickly is also important as well. Things that you will use often needs to be more centered or larger in the framework. Also, if you are designing a character sheet, make sure to keep it at most 2 pages to success in completing the more common tasks or skills. Stuff like Magic or Technology specializations will most likely need extra bookkeeping outside of the first two sheets.
I really love what you are doing with tabletop rpgs, I really hope this becomes a series of its own... Like analyzing tabletop games, or card games... Maybe in a broad sense like this, or something more specific like one game at a time...
Thank you for another episode on tabletop! I have been a GM for a year now and it's always cool to learn how to do my job at the table better since everyone is affected by it. I would say that my players know what I'm good at and what generally to expect, but this understanding you just gave me will certainly help!
This is nice. You really are expanding yourselves. Not only video game design, now tabletop games as well, and you talk about the relation between real life and gaming. In Extra History you are now covering big epidemics and scientific advances. And you added the Extra Mythology. And your presentador changed as well. One day, you guys will do a video about the beginnings of this channel.
Umm yes but no. The best thing you can do as a GM is hold a session 0 to talk to your players about what kinds of games you run and help them create character ideas that fit into. Sometimes if I have multiple ideas I'll make a page with a brief summary of each and let the players decide on what kind of adventure they want (during this time it's also important for the players to give me what kinds of characters they want to play). Additionally I find this video uses the raw player stats rather than talking about the much more useful information of skills. If we're playing 3.5 rather than looking at what the dwarf fighters stats are I want to see where her skill points are allocated. Same goes in 5e, I want to see where people put their proficiency and what they chose for their backround. You know that paladin in the video with the high Cha, yes I'd assume that they're looking for more social encounters than a fighter because they picked a Cha class but what kind of social encounters? It's very different if they chose the Charlatan background than if they did something maybe a bit more typical like the Noble background. I'd call this video incomplete, I don't think you delve deeply enough for this to be a good look on the subject.
There's also negative correlation. You see high will saves not because your players want to face mind effecting magic, but because they dread it. This, not a desire for diplomacy, is probably also why you most often see paladins. And people never pick paladin because they want the GM to throw paladin trap moral dilemmas at them. Unless you have RP virgins the way the players build their characters may not be a reflection of what they want, but of what previous GMs or the Internet have taught them to expect.
i use that technique too, your a DM, your only omnipotent in the game haha. One of the most important lessons i learned being a DM is that talking and involving your players opinations into the game is way better than triying to read their minds, obiusly you are not going to say "do you prefer plot twist A or B?" but you culd ask if they want to do some character arcs betwen PC and other PC, or even an NPC, or asking "what tipe of history want to have with your character?". It will improve the expirience for everyone and foment role playing.... exept that they were murderhobous, thats a dificult task to resolve
@@aronblancia15 I'm sorry, I admit that my comment wasn't written as best as it could be but I think I got my message across. Or did you mean something else by that?
I agree with you on pretty much everything you brought up, though some might consider your wording slightly harsh. Session 0 is super useful. It gets everyone on the same page, literally, and solves some problems before they pop up during gameplay. Also knowing more than the stats for the players can really change the way the campaign unfolds. For instance in a 5e campaign I played a Warlock who had the Eyes of the Rune Keeper Invocation, which allowed him to read anything. Had book or word related puzzles been a major part of the campaign, I could have destroyed much of the tension immediately with that one ability. Oh gee, this mysterious demonic text says to "look in the well for a portal to hell." I want to see a little more depth in these videos too because I really enjoy them. Table top gaming is quite rich and full of topics to explore.
It's definitely true that the stats a player focuses on reflects how they want to play the game. This is why, when I run a game, I prefer to see everyone's character sheets before I get too far into the design process for a campaign. I don't want to plan an adventure that focuses heavily on stealth and intrigue and then later discover that every player has built an illiterate barbarian half-orc.
Unless they are sneaky illiterate barbarian half-orcs trying to undermine their tyrannical clan leader via conspiracy only done in whispered meetings? I don't even start designing an adventure until I have all the character sheets in hand and have worked with the players in crafting their characters. Then it's off to figure out all the different strands of story and mechanics that I can tie together.
As a GM and player, this is really interesting to me and something I never really thought about. However! These are just assumptions based on the character sheets and, in my opinion. the best way to find out what your players want out of the game is to simply ask them. If they don't know what their character would want, come up with some scenarios or questions to help guide them. Your bard could just want to be a murder hobo and your barbarian could want to one day be a court noble. Communication is the name of the game for basically any tabletop RPG so don't be afraid to communicate with your group!
To see this concept taken further you should look at a Roleplay system called FATE. It allows the characters to define attributes of the character that are also details about the world, these are open ended but work best when they both give advantage to and cause difficulties for that character.
Digging the TTRPG content. Due to my lack of coding skills almost all of my game design has taken place in TTRPGs so it's nice to see you speaking to them directly.
I always format my character sheets in notepad, then moved them to my phone so that page 1 is base stats + defenses. page 2 is all relevant combat rolls. 3 is skills and 4 is inventory. Pages 5+ is just extra information like the full text of feats, elaborated details of racial abilities, and anything else that doesn't need to be quick referenced, with the general page order being so I can minimize downtime when it counts.
I’m a big proponent of player meetings. Before each new campaign I try to get all my players together and I talk to them asking what each would like to get out of it. It could be very general like “I want old school dungeon crawls” or “I want intrigue and diplomacy” or something very detailed. The main thing is to keep it entertaining for everyone
My favorite character to date was a D&D character created randomly by Beyond for a oneshot (that turned into a threeshot, as they so often do). He was a level ten human with a draconic bloodline ranger/sorcerer/cleric multiclass, and I had the absolute time of my life looking at the stats and preferences that gave him and trying to craft some comprehensible backstory out of that chaos. In our campaign of largely joke characters, he became the party dad and one of the only people making sane decisions. At the end of the campaign, it was heavily implied that most of the group just went back with him to the tiny farming town that he protected. He's the only TRPG character I've made so far to really genuinely take on a life of his own, and I'm really itching for a chance to bring him back someday. :)
I agree a little that stats might reveal what kind of game a player likes, I always pick healing wizard characters. But I'm not sure that says 'I want this' but more, a good GM will reward any player's choices of character by providing opportunity to use those stats... The perilous situation example you give, where players fall back on their strongest stats, is a good survival strategy but it also allows them to justify their usefulness to the party. Which is the most important thing to be doing in order to encourage a happy and united team. If you give all the glory to the OP warrior characters, a well rounded group will fall apart and the other player's may as well not be there!
I just recently started playing DnD ad this has helped me a little. I didn't really know what I want my character to be like. This has prompted me to actually think about it, Thanks!
there is a ton of potential here for RPGs that work around your character sheet. for example, in the game you want to get into a room but there is a guard on front of the door. the game checks your stats. if you put a lot of points into "strength" the game will make the guard on edge, with a lot of HP and a good weapon to offer a nice fight. and if the player put a lot of points into stealth the guard will be asleep and you can sneak behind them. I think a game that changes itself in subtle ways in order to fit your play style will be awesome to play
Glad to see another diplomat player. My favorite character I've ever made was my teifling roguelock that put everything possible into charisma and illusions.
In one of our G.U.R.P.S campaigns my sister decided to be a mage. A crazy pyromaniac, on arm'ed mage lady. She decided to lose an arm to have the points to upgrade her magery. Her cackling as she set people (not always the enemy) on fire is quite memorable.
In my opinion, the two fundamental types of challenges in most RPGs are ones which deliberately play to the PCs strengths to make them feel awesome and vindicated, and ones which don't play to their strengths in order to force them to be creative in using imperfect tools to overcome an imperfect challenge.
Thanks I literally just realised my entire party is almost all diplomancers and I've been throwing loads of fights there way. I had better re-think that smuggling mission.
This was really insightful and helpful. I am designing some RPG character sheets for two d&d sessions I am in (rwby and pokemon theme) and this really gave me a better idea of what all needs to be put on them.
Nice thoughts for those that use the rpg character sheet in the book but the second part is a bit more dicey :) Many character groups are mixed and many groups want to have the pillars of the game world covered. This is especially true in D&D. And sometimes characters after Session 0 make characters to your game world. As in if you call your campaign “The Drow - Dragon Wars” a person may still want to have those scores or abilities just so as not be a dragon snack but they may want to focus on some other way. what I am saying is don’t assume the sheet is telling you anything if you don’t make sure by talking to your players. Some people (a lot) the character sheet will you can tell what they want to focus on by the intersection of Abilities - Skills - spells. For new players often true, but for more veteran players sometimes not so much. You could have a Player make character very capable in combat but the actual player at the table really wants to mostly focus on a fish out of water political game - and they want to do that with out any great advantage You see for a payer with a decade of experience under his/her belt they oftr. get off on focusing on the weakness (or weaker) parts of the character to have a more fun time. For these players it is more of a Role Playing game then a Roll playing game. They get more fun out of playing a lovable looser that just gets by then a master murderhobo or a seduces-am-all. They choose a Lovable looser over a Mary Sue. Don’t get me wrong you advice is more often then not fair advice but YMMV. And if you are in doubt I say talk to your players
All the truly cool gaming sessions I've been involved in- written backstories were required as they would be a bit clearer than looking at possibly odd decisions on character stats by pl;ayer.
As a GM who is currently having creative block (and general frustration) with putting together their next session, thanks for this video. It didn't tell me anything completely new, but that's not the point. It reinforced some things I let drift too far into the background of my memory.
Weekend roleplaying event. Made a character with literally no spells that could deal damage. Made them a complete and utter derp. It was amazing. Accidentally blew everything up (it's a very, very long story) and basically wound up breaking magic for a while, even in for people in other games. Fun times. :P
We have a very popular Chinese rpg tabletop game called “san guo Sha (三国杀）” it’s like three kingdom kill. It has a kill (stab) card a (dodge) etc. Bring back good memories.
Great vid, some good points. However I feel your example of DnD is less ideal, as DnD is principally built around combat (that's where most of the content in the rule books is after all), and it's worth including that caveat. A paladin might be dumping points in charisma to empower their magic horse, not because they actually want more conversations.
A Fallout/Elder Scrolls-esque game that rebalances the world and edits dungeons based on your starting character sheet would be some truly amazing gameplay. Imagine the replayability behind that. Actually wanting to go guns blazing on this character, max out strength and drop charisma, then the game could adjust to make things fiercer, tougher, and all around harder to fight, while hiding or deleting all of the diplomatic or seduction based options.
I would love to play D&D with my friends! I think I will read everything in the player handbook and try to be a GM because my roommates don't know how to play but they all want to! Thanks for your videos, as always they are the best and I just love to watch them when I have the time :) Love from Canada In French Canada By a French French
Tu vas avoir besoin du guide du maître et d'au moins le premier bestiaire aussi, a D&D y'a plein de trucs importants pour le GM qui sont pas dans le guide des joueurs.
I would recommend a small campaign or one-shot in order to let everyone get a feel for the mechanics and how seriously the campaign will go (my campaigns tend to be loose with the specific mechanics, and let you get by with some strange things, while others are much more strict) before starting your campaign. I'd also recommend knowing the general outline of the story, but having enough room to improvise when the party inevitably does the opposite of what you want them to do.
@@cody1o3 Because some people like their D&D to feel like XCOM It's as valid as playing your D&D game like a Telltale game. Both have strengths and weaknesses. I'm merely saying that, while a decent metric, especially in 5e or CoC, it is not perfect.
@@cody1o3 The fighting aspect is a huge part of the game. Just look at D&D: by far the biggest pat of the rulebook is about fighting. While RP is one pillar, having a tactical map and some foes on it can fill an evening with fun.
I wonder if anyone's ever used this in a computer RPG. Like, you put together your character, and there's a hidden system in the game that looks at it and subtly reweighs some of the encounters, particularly random ones, to fit what you want to play better?
Has the crew thought about doing a side series strictly on tabletop games? I think you could utilize your collective skill sets really well for something like that. 🙂
I'm loving these Tabletop games episode. I'm testing my design skills (since I'm still learning how to code) by making one, with lighter RPG elements since my friends aren't a lot into that stuff (they always played simpler version of DnD because all the stuff in the original game), and after a bunch of months it's shaping up pretty good (still need to fix some balance issues) , too bad that the group I was planning the game for is splitting up
What's a memorable character you made for a tabletop game, and why?
Half-Orc Paladin. He wasn't optimal, but I came up with a memorable backstory for him.
12 hours ago this uploaded only few seconds ago
A human sailor who had a boat that cod shrink when he wanted so it could go in his pocket, and it grew when it came into contact with water. A barrel of laughs when it rained.
I made the exact opposite of my irl self, was really fun to play
I just recently made my first-ever RPG character for the REUP Star Wars RPG. He's a heavily physical combat-oriented Barabel who distrusts most technology that I gave motivations to move prospective plots forward.
I see you Extra Credits.
Fancy seeing you here, Zee!
Zee be like: 👀👀👀
It’s the funee wizard man
Oh hey, we got Zee here!
Didn’t expect to see you here
3:04 I SAW THAT!!!
My favorite character was a robot that was a walking death machine. Every point was put into being able to snipe a fly from a mile away. So naturally I made him a pacifist who loved helping out his team with his almost zero stats messing everything up.
Sounds like a scaled down Iron Giant, and that's adorable.
Chungus, Jim Sterling's favourite character.
Though I don't see him playing a warrior class, unless it's one of those simple versions that lump rangers in.
@@ZBott Class: Chungus Race: Chungus
Deity: Chungus Alignment: William Dafoe
If he was Big Chungus he would be Kevin's favourite
Hey, I love this trend of tabletop games, especially whenever you talk about non-D&D games.
I would absolutely love this to just become its own series.
"How to roll for initiative"
Extra Dice?
Extra Initiative?
Extra XP?
Extra Roles?
Back in the early days they stated that they like to use Extra Credits to explore games in general, not just video games or board games. Now that Dan is gone it might change, but overall I think this approach is better.
Yep
1:42 Chungus the warrior. I see you animators, I see you.
Adding to that, *they drew the team as the d&d cartoon show characters*
It's at 2:04 as well.
Aw dang. I thought this might be an episode on how to design a character sheet for your own games.
well, it does make you think about how size of different elements on the sheet matter
I know right? The older episodes used to be so much more informative.
Well heres what I got from this video on designing the character sheet.
1 make important things bold and easy to find. Move less important ideas to the side. So all core mechanics in bold or in a bold border and easy to see. And variant mechanics or optional ones on the side or a separate page.
Me too, especially since I'm putting so much time in my universe, I thought this might help me translate that into a game...
You could check a graphic design page for info on visual hierarchy.
Shoutout to Gaijin Goombah and the quote “Real Ninjas Wear Blue
;p
Thought the exact same thing when I say that.
:3
Yep, although I wonder if we will see some extra creditz stuff in Giajins vid next
I sang it along just like all the rest of you, don't deny it!
I'd consider this inaccurate advice. plenty of players will put a bunch of points into skills for dealing with traps exactly so they don't have to deal with traps.
talking with players is the best way of finding out what they vant
To add to this, players putting points into a given stat, ability, or skill doesn't necessarily mean they want to see that thing happen often in the game; it could be a sign that they think YOU (the DM) have a tendency to use the given stat/ability/ or skill in your scenarios and stories. Definitely do some introspection before taking this video's advice to heart.
Agreed on both counts. Looking over where a player invested lots of character resources can help suggest areas to discuss with them (just as important are places with no/few resources spent, when you would expect to see more for that character/class/player/campaign/etc.), but there's really no substitute for having a quick talk to ensure everyone's on the same page.
Wouldn't this, warding off against the GM, be a sign of bad previous experiences? And why even bother GMing to people who would think like that? That said, it's up to the GM to assuage those fears from the get go. "Hey, people, this is not a 'gotcha, you're dead' game. Just tell me what you want to play and we'll try to work with that." How hard can it be to get a group worth playing with to cooperate?
I was about to say similar. When I pick up skills for my characters, it's not only about what I want the character to do but rather making sure the character does survive from whatever the game master throws at them. This is especially true in combative systems in which there is a fear of letting the party down if your character is poorly prepared, pressuring players to invest points for the rainy day. Other words: Making my warrior a tough fighter mostly equals with that I want to be useful for the party, not that I'm not into any dramatic conversations. I just didn't invest to it because the party already has smooth talkers and they needed someone tough to keep monsters away from them.
I do consider this advice as a novel, interesting approach though. It probably works better in campaigns in which the games does not resemble a game of chess and there is more room for creative encounters and solutions, giving the players actual freedom to create whatever they want. However, like in all role-playing, communication between the players and the game master is priceless.
Definitely agree on your second point especially. I as a 5E player was conditioned to put a lot of points into perception, since my first GM called a check for it every twenty minutes or so.
I would absolutely love to see more tabletop game design covered!
This video gives me a lot of nostalgia. My old role playing days, I never really thought about it but I spent hours on my character sheets, they were probably my favorite part of the game, I think I still have a bunch somewhere in my house, some of those characters were more real to me than people in real life.
Mathew: "Zoey, what is a 'sword of hecking riddles' " ?
Zoey:"Roll Initiative" .
I love your cat, but she is SO violent.....
“Real Ninjas Wear Blue”
Nice Gaijin Goomba reference. Game recognizes game I see
I see that probably Gaijin Goombah reference at 3:04
Nice!
*tips hat*
@@davidhueso thanks to the nod towards our favorite eastern cultural analyzer.
That darn jingle.
@@barrybend7189 It's a shame that his costume this last Halloween was black. Kinda Ironic.
Nice catch
As someone who is actively designing a tabletop RPG, I am loving the recent videos that focus on more concepts surrounding tabletop games. Thank you for this. When we were designing our character sheets (which still needs improvements), the ability to find information quickly is also important as well. Things that you will use often needs to be more centered or larger in the framework. Also, if you are designing a character sheet, make sure to keep it at most 2 pages to success in completing the more common tasks or skills. Stuff like Magic or Technology specializations will most likely need extra bookkeeping outside of the first two sheets.
Love the references to the old D&D cartoon character designs! "Fear not, Ranger..."
Carl Sams "Barbarian..."
I did not notice that until I read this.
Character sheets are the sheet
A good idea on paper and in practice
I havent finished the video yet but Im just going to drop a ref here
BUT WHAT ABOUT DRAGONS
And yes I know it isnt even related
"YOU CANNOT FORGET ABOUT THE DRAGONS, PEOPLE" - 420ShadDeusVult69
@@thecommentetor6710 as all men should be
Just got done watching his newest video!
*Machicolations*
Never thought I would see those old D&D cartoon classes again, love the design!
I really love what you are doing with tabletop rpgs, I really hope this becomes a series of its own... Like analyzing tabletop games, or card games...
Maybe in a broad sense like this, or something more specific like one game at a time...
Thank you for another episode on tabletop! I have been a GM for a year now and it's always cool to learn how to do my job at the table better since everyone is affected by it.
I would say that my players know what I'm good at and what generally to expect, but this understanding you just gave me will certainly help!
"Kind of like a User Interface, but for a tabletop game."
So... literally a User Interface?
This is nice. You really are expanding yourselves. Not only video game design, now tabletop games as well, and you talk about the relation between real life and gaming. In Extra History you are now covering big epidemics and scientific advances. And you added the Extra Mythology. And your presentador changed as well. One day, you guys will do a video about the beginnings of this channel.
Umm yes but no. The best thing you can do as a GM is hold a session 0 to talk to your players about what kinds of games you run and help them create character ideas that fit into. Sometimes if I have multiple ideas I'll make a page with a brief summary of each and let the players decide on what kind of adventure they want (during this time it's also important for the players to give me what kinds of characters they want to play). Additionally I find this video uses the raw player stats rather than talking about the much more useful information of skills. If we're playing 3.5 rather than looking at what the dwarf fighters stats are I want to see where her skill points are allocated. Same goes in 5e, I want to see where people put their proficiency and what they chose for their backround. You know that paladin in the video with the high Cha, yes I'd assume that they're looking for more social encounters than a fighter because they picked a Cha class but what kind of social encounters? It's very different if they chose the Charlatan background than if they did something maybe a bit more typical like the Noble background. I'd call this video incomplete, I don't think you delve deeply enough for this to be a good look on the subject.
There's also negative correlation. You see high will saves not because your players want to face mind effecting magic, but because they dread it. This, not a desire for diplomacy, is probably also why you most often see paladins. And people never pick paladin because they want the GM to throw paladin trap moral dilemmas at them.
Unless you have RP virgins the way the players build their characters may not be a reflection of what they want, but of what previous GMs or the Internet have taught them to expect.
i use that technique too, your a DM, your only omnipotent in the game haha. One of the most important lessons i learned being a DM is that talking and involving your players opinations into the game is way better than triying to read their minds, obiusly you are not going to say "do you prefer plot twist A or B?" but you culd ask if they want to do some character arcs betwen PC and other PC, or even an NPC, or asking "what tipe of history want to have with your character?". It will improve the expirience for everyone and foment role playing.... exept that they were murderhobous, thats a dificult task to resolve
How did you write that?
@@aronblancia15 I'm sorry, I admit that my comment wasn't written as best as it could be but I think I got my message across. Or did you mean something else by that?
I agree with you on pretty much everything you brought up, though some might consider your wording slightly harsh.
Session 0 is super useful. It gets everyone on the same page, literally, and solves some problems before they pop up during gameplay. Also knowing more than the stats for the players can really change the way the campaign unfolds.
For instance in a 5e campaign I played a Warlock who had the Eyes of the Rune Keeper Invocation, which allowed him to read anything. Had book or word related puzzles been a major part of the campaign, I could have destroyed much of the tension immediately with that one ability. Oh gee, this mysterious demonic text says to "look in the well for a portal to hell."
I want to see a little more depth in these videos too because I really enjoy them. Table top gaming is quite rich and full of topics to explore.
3:07 ....is that a Which Ninja reference?
Levi Fi yes. Yes it is
Yes it is
sure is !
My local game store actually has a Big Chungus minifigure. No joke. It's GLORIOUS.
Phhase i’m not sure whether to be disgusted or pleased
I really like it when you tap into the tabletop RPG stuff!
It's definitely true that the stats a player focuses on reflects how they want to play the game. This is why, when I run a game, I prefer to see everyone's character sheets before I get too far into the design process for a campaign. I don't want to plan an adventure that focuses heavily on stealth and intrigue and then later discover that every player has built an illiterate barbarian half-orc.
Unless they are sneaky illiterate barbarian half-orcs trying to undermine their tyrannical clan leader via conspiracy only done in whispered meetings?
I don't even start designing an adventure until I have all the character sheets in hand and have worked with the players in crafting their characters. Then it's off to figure out all the different strands of story and mechanics that I can tie together.
As a GM and player, this is really interesting to me and something I never really thought about. However! These are just assumptions based on the character sheets and, in my opinion. the best way to find out what your players want out of the game is to simply ask them. If they don't know what their character would want, come up with some scenarios or questions to help guide them. Your bard could just want to be a murder hobo and your barbarian could want to one day be a court noble. Communication is the name of the game for basically any tabletop RPG so don't be afraid to communicate with your group!
Yay to animated Dungeons & Dragons references!
"Fear not, Ranger, Barbarian, Magician, Thief, Cavalier, and Acrobat!"
- Dungeon Master, 1983
To see this concept taken further you should look at a Roleplay system called FATE. It allows the characters to define attributes of the character that are also details about the world, these are open ended but work best when they both give advantage to and cause difficulties for that character.
Oh, diplomacy. My favourite choice as well. I love it when its blade cleaves enemies in two.
What? Diplomacy is my axe's name.
Digging the TTRPG content. Due to my lack of coding skills almost all of my game design has taken place in TTRPGs so it's nice to see you speaking to them directly.
I always format my character sheets in notepad, then moved them to my phone so that page 1 is base stats + defenses. page 2 is all relevant combat rolls. 3 is skills and 4 is inventory. Pages 5+ is just extra information like the full text of feats, elaborated details of racial abilities, and anything else that doesn't need to be quick referenced, with the general page order being so I can minimize downtime when it counts.
I’m a big proponent of player meetings. Before each new campaign I try to get all my players together and I talk to them asking what each would like to get out of it. It could be very general like “I want old school dungeon crawls” or “I want intrigue and diplomacy” or something very detailed. The main thing is to keep it entertaining for everyone
My favorite character to date was a D&D character created randomly by Beyond for a oneshot (that turned into a threeshot, as they so often do). He was a level ten human with a draconic bloodline ranger/sorcerer/cleric multiclass, and I had the absolute time of my life looking at the stats and preferences that gave him and trying to craft some comprehensible backstory out of that chaos. In our campaign of largely joke characters, he became the party dad and one of the only people making sane decisions. At the end of the campaign, it was heavily implied that most of the group just went back with him to the tiny farming town that he protected. He's the only TRPG character I've made so far to really genuinely take on a life of his own, and I'm really itching for a chance to bring him back someday. :)
I'm a big fan of tabletop RPGs, and would love to see more content in that vein from you guys!
I agree a little that stats might reveal what kind of game a player likes, I always pick healing wizard characters. But I'm not sure that says 'I want this' but more, a good GM will reward any player's choices of character by providing opportunity to use those stats... The perilous situation example you give, where players fall back on their strongest stats, is a good survival strategy but it also allows them to justify their usefulness to the party. Which is the most important thing to be doing in order to encourage a happy and united team. If you give all the glory to the OP warrior characters, a well rounded group will fall apart and the other player's may as well not be there!
I just recently started playing DnD ad this has helped me a little. I didn't really know what I want my character to be like. This has prompted me to actually think about it, Thanks!
Just as the campaign influences your party, the party shapes the world.
there is a ton of potential here for RPGs that work around your character sheet. for example, in the game you want to get into a room but there is a guard on front of the door. the game checks your stats. if you put a lot of points into "strength" the game will make the guard on edge, with a lot of HP and a good weapon to offer a nice fight. and if the player put a lot of points into stealth the guard will be asleep and you can sneak behind them. I think a game that changes itself in subtle ways in order to fit your play style will be awesome to play
I love this! Are you gonna do more tabletop rpg stuff?
Glad to see another diplomat player. My favorite character I've ever made was my teifling roguelock that put everything possible into charisma and illusions.
Diplomancy is old hat, now jumplomancy, there's something you can take to the stratosphere.
Great Episode!
More RPG related Stuff! Pretty please?
That pun at the end was beautiful
Jim Sterling and Gaijin Goombah referenced on an Extra Credits video tackling a subject I'm enthusiastic on?! God bless you guys.
I really like how you animated some scenes from the Dnd TV show.
In one of our G.U.R.P.S campaigns my sister decided to be a mage. A crazy pyromaniac, on arm'ed mage lady. She decided to lose an arm to have the points to upgrade her magery. Her cackling as she set people (not always the enemy) on fire is quite memorable.
In my opinion, the two fundamental types of challenges in most RPGs are ones which deliberately play to the PCs strengths to make them feel awesome and vindicated, and ones which don't play to their strengths in order to force them to be creative in using imperfect tools to overcome an imperfect challenge.
Love all the references in the video... especially for the D&D cartoon!!!
nice , someone got that !
nice to see this follow up video that is really just as good as last weeks
That was an ending full of sneaky determination.
really digging the tabletop design episodes, thank you.
Love these tabletop RPG videos!
Thanks I literally just realised my entire party is almost all diplomancers and I've been throwing loads of fights there way. I had better re-think that smuggling mission.
3:09 Thank you so much for putting that reference in.
*tips hat*
4:11 Add horns to that character, and that's Jane/Prudence from Outside Xbox!
This was really insightful and helpful. I am designing some RPG character sheets for two d&d sessions I am in (rwby and pokemon theme) and this really gave me a better idea of what all needs to be put on them.
I love the TTRPG content you've been doing lately, great to change it up and also very interesting!
Yay. More Table Top episodes. This needs to be a series. 😃
Nice thoughts for those that use the rpg character sheet in the book but the second part is a bit more dicey :)
Many character groups are mixed and many groups want to have the pillars of the game world covered. This is especially true in D&D. And sometimes characters after Session 0 make characters to your game world. As in if you call your campaign “The Drow - Dragon Wars” a person may still want to have those scores or abilities just so as not be a dragon snack but they may want to focus on some other way.
what I am saying is don’t assume the sheet is telling you anything if you don’t make sure by talking to your players. Some people (a lot) the character sheet will you can tell what they want to focus on by the intersection of Abilities - Skills - spells. For new players often true, but for more veteran players sometimes not so much.
You could have a Player make character very capable in combat but the actual player at the table really wants to mostly focus on a fish out of water political game - and they want to do that with out any great advantage
You see for a payer with a decade of experience under his/her belt they oftr. get off on focusing on the weakness (or weaker) parts of the character to have a more fun time. For these players it is more of a Role Playing game then a Roll playing game. They get more fun out of playing a lovable looser that just gets by then a master murderhobo or a seduces-am-all. They choose a Lovable looser over a Mary Sue.
Don’t get me wrong you advice is more often then not fair advice but YMMV. And if you are in doubt I say talk to your players
Really enjoying these tabletop episodes!
"Role Initiative" would be a great name for a DnD livestream.
"If the spellcaster makes a wizard with all combat spells, you know what they want to do"
JUST FIREBALL.
All the truly cool gaming sessions I've been involved in- written backstories were required as they would be a bit clearer than looking at possibly odd decisions on character stats by pl;ayer.
"Real Ninjas Wear Blue." The Goomba will be pleased. Great video.
I just realized that some of the characters here are from a old dnd animated show
Guess I rolled a high initiative
Nice
@@juliuskingsley4434 FBI DON'T YOU DARE BUST MY DOOR ikt's expensive man
@@jacobliu1274 *destroys door* now they cant
you can thank me later
@@lucasbeck1391 thank you
As a GM who is currently having creative block (and general frustration) with putting together their next session, thanks for this video. It didn't tell me anything completely new, but that's not the point. It reinforced some things I let drift too far into the background of my memory.
God I love D&D so much, I'm the kind of person that likes diplomsti but I also love seeking behind the enemies
Weekend roleplaying event. Made a character with literally no spells that could deal damage. Made them a complete and utter derp. It was amazing. Accidentally blew everything up (it's a very, very long story) and basically wound up breaking magic for a while, even in for people in other games. Fun times. :P
We have a very popular Chinese rpg tabletop game called “san guo Sha (三国杀）” it’s like three kingdom kill. It has a kill (stab) card a (dodge) etc. Bring back good memories.
Instantly recognised the very, VERY familiar Undertale tune on the end there.
I saw those D&D cartoon references.
Great vid, some good points. However I feel your example of DnD is less ideal, as DnD is principally built around combat (that's where most of the content in the rule books is after all), and it's worth including that caveat. A paladin might be dumping points in charisma to empower their magic horse, not because they actually want more conversations.
Really love the dice into tabletop gaming ideas! Any chance that you guys might talk about tabletop wargaming such as warhammer 40k?
THAT MUSIC I SMILED LIKE A GRAND OL’ FOOL!!!
A Fallout/Elder Scrolls-esque game that rebalances the world and edits dungeons based on your starting character sheet would be some truly amazing gameplay. Imagine the replayability behind that.
Actually wanting to go guns blazing on this character, max out strength and drop charisma, then the game could adjust to make things fiercer, tougher, and all around harder to fight, while hiding or deleting all of the diplomatic or seduction based options.
Have Really been enjoying these ttrpg episodes lately, keep'em coming.
I would love to play D&D with my friends! I think I will read everything in the player handbook and try to be a GM because my roommates don't know how to play but they all want to! Thanks for your videos, as always they are the best and I just love to watch them when I have the time :)
Love from Canada
In French Canada
By a French French
There's a site where you can find others and play online called Role Gate. Check it out!
Tu vas avoir besoin du guide du maître et d'au moins le premier bestiaire aussi, a D&D y'a plein de trucs importants pour le GM qui sont pas dans le guide des joueurs.
Nice source for solid advice on gming is the angry gm. Has a blogthing, strong opinions and the best how to gm for the first time I ever read.
I would recommend a small campaign or one-shot in order to let everyone get a feel for the mechanics and how seriously the campaign will go (my campaigns tend to be loose with the specific mechanics, and let you get by with some strange things, while others are much more strict) before starting your campaign. I'd also recommend knowing the general outline of the story, but having enough room to improvise when the party inevitably does the opposite of what you want them to do.
I hope you have a most wonderful time!!! I've been an RPG'er since the early 90's and I've had a love of it since the beginning!
Or the Paladin with that with those points in Charisma put them their because that affects their smite damage, and they have no interest in RP.
Why even play a paladin if you've no interest in rp xD better question why play a roleplaying game with no interest in rp? XD
@@cody1o3 Because some people like their D&D to feel like XCOM It's as valid as playing your D&D game like a Telltale game. Both have strengths and weaknesses. I'm merely saying that, while a decent metric, especially in 5e or CoC, it is not perfect.
@@cody1o3 Damage output optimization.
@@cody1o3
The fighting aspect is a huge part of the game. Just look at D&D: by far the biggest pat of the rulebook is about fighting. While RP is one pillar, having a tactical map and some foes on it can fill an evening with fun.
@@alicesteel Why bother? A DM can just homebrew inflate monsters' HP to cancel your damage optimization.
missed the opportunity to name it "call of CAThulu" at 4:22
I really thought/hoped this would go into the design of the sheet itself more for game designers, but all of this is good info for GMs regardless.
I wonder if anyone's ever used this in a computer RPG. Like, you put together your character, and there's a hidden system in the game that looks at it and subtly reweighs some of the encounters, particularly random ones, to fit what you want to play better?
A D&D video with a Monster Hunter reference at the end? Count me in!
I really enjoy the references to the old D&D cartoon.
The DnD cartoon references are appreciated and noted. Thank you EC!
"And did the clever mage pick all combat spells? Iiii think you know what they wanna do." - PFFFT xdxd Literally me in Dragon Age xd
nice undertail remix at the end lol Great video
Has the crew thought about doing a side series strictly on tabletop games? I think you could utilize your collective skill sets really well for something like that. 🙂
Zoe's offhand weapon is probably a mace of Meownster slaying.
I see all the characters from the old D&D cartoon. Ah, the memories...
I love the Gaijin Goombah "real ninjas wear blue!" reference!
I'm loving these Tabletop games episode. I'm testing my design skills (since I'm still learning how to code) by making one, with lighter RPG elements since my friends aren't a lot into that stuff (they always played simpler version of DnD because all the stuff in the original game), and after a bunch of months it's shaping up pretty good (still need to fix some balance issues) , too bad that the group I was planning the game for is splitting up
3:04 I see that Gaijin Goomba reference you got there ;)
After your character dies eat the character sheet
Love the gaijin goomba reference
But I didn't see any for the adventure zone
“Real Ninjas wear blue.”
I see that Gaijin Goombah reference.
Excited to see you guys at PAX east :)