Thank you for introducing the purple baby. This makes the stress of playing infinitely easier.

I would add a sixth rule, a little extra that can help with the rest: Only deny a player's action if it is impossible. On my first game DM'ing (it was last week, so it shows I'm a huge rookie), one of the players went to the boss room without the rest of the group to persuade the bad guy. He wanted to convince the guy he wants to join the rank of the thieves's guild. Instead of saying "no" and triggering a bossfight that he couldn't win, I let him roll Deception (with advantage, since he was a Hobgoblin in the middle of Bugbears and Goblins) against the boss's insight. The player fooled him completely, being able to send the goblins at their demise and clear the dungeon while the rest of the team cleared the rooms sneakily. It was an amazing moment that led to the players cleverly clearing the dungeon and beating the big bad guy alone instead of with a crapton of goblins. That doesn't mean the DM should never say "no". If a player wants to defy gravity without the proper means to, then he can't do it. But creative ideas should be at least tried, with the rewards being given by the roll of the dice.

@FrostJarl

5 жыл бұрын

A story from the first session of a campaign I was in, There were 5 of us in the party, a cleric of an unknown god(at least he didn't tell us in the party), a homebrewed slime character, a fox-person wizard, a low intelligence barbarian who could only count to 5 who would count everything they found by throwing them behind them and shouting the number, and me on a Warforged cleric who was trying to teach the barbarian. We had all awoken in this fortress with very little of our past memories and as we explored we found a library/laboratory and the party began searching through the books to try and find anything that may help us figure out where we were/how to get out and the barbarian sees this and decides to take down a random book and starts to stare at the pages and turn them whenever he noticed someone else do the same. As we're all still searching the GM's planned boss comes in and sees all of us rifling through his lab and is immediately displeased. Our first attempted negotiation with them goes horribly and they've decided they are going to kill us and use us for experiments and asks if we have any last requests, the barbarian just innocently looks up and asks if he can at least finish the book(he can't read) and the GM has him roll to bluff and he rolls for insight. Barb rolls a natural 20, and the GM calls one of us over to see his die to show us he rolled a natural 1. The boss agree to let him "finish reading" the book which gave me enough time to come up with an idea to propose to the boss for us to work for them and assist with his experiments. At the end of the session of GM just looks at us and says "Why can't I have a normal bossfight with you guys?" We have a habit of subverting his intended boss fights through various means, even unintentionally at times. Our GM is a fan of Matthew Mercer's usual response to a player wanting to do something "You can certainly try"

@markcarpenter6020

2 жыл бұрын

I was taught to never say no. If the player wants to try something have them make the role.

@e4Bc4Qf3Qf7

2 жыл бұрын

@@markcarpenter6020 Thats a bad idea. No matter how good your roll, you can't lift a two ton boulder and you can't fly. Setting boundaries for what can be accomplished is essential for both immersion and fun. Being able to ignore reality because you rolled a natural 20 leads to a lot of bs that just isn't that fun.

@markcarpenter6020

2 жыл бұрын

@@e4Bc4Qf3Qf7 Im pretty sure an argument can be made a Goliath can lift a two ton boulder. A warforged might be able to as well.(and regular people can lift a car under the effects of adrenaline. Though you will do some pretty serious damage to your body doing it) Fairies can fly as can most mage and some bards, monks, etc. (And if you go out in a tornado or class 4 hurricane you can fly too...the landing would be a problem though) Things have to be applied with common sense but this is a game where you can literally resurrect the dead and fight vampires so common sense itself needs to be taken with a grain of salt. At the end of the day it is the DM's job to explain how things happen. If you have things that aren't fun happen you need a different DM. Besides most times the role will fail nat 20 represents the concept of the golden BB (if you have never heard the term it is an old military term for when an aircraft is taken down with small arms fire or something similar. Basically a one in a billion chance of it happening.)

@e4Bc4Qf3Qf7

2 жыл бұрын

@@markcarpenter6020 except its not one in a billion. Its 5%. Which happens pretty damn often when your dm lets you roll to do absurd shit every time you want. Your examples were examples of ingame universe situations where it would be reasonable, and times you wouldn’t even need a high roll. That isn’t the same as allowing it to happen with a good roll in any situation. Internal consistency is what establishes rules and lets people be cool for doing *what they are good at* not whatever they feel like and get lucky doing because their dm feels nat 20=defy the laws of reality.

rule 0: make sure your players are having fun. rule 1: be a player in the types of game you plan to DM in. rule 2: don't be afraid to not know the rules rule 3: be a performer, your as much a storyteller as a DM. rule 4: don't throw the first punch in a fight in real life, be kind to your players. rule 5: use the flying purple baby. ALL HAIL THE PURPLE BABY! or don't let the disappearance of PCs bog things down.

@zacharychaira808

4 жыл бұрын

Thank you for the summary it sincerly does help 🤘😎

@NANA-zz8hb

4 жыл бұрын

You forgot the T posing rule.

HEY, YOU SHARED MY PURPLE BABY! Cool. :p

Do you get paid to DM? How do you feed yourself when you have 9 games a week?

@boneking591

5 жыл бұрын

Technically, yes

@hachi9404

5 жыл бұрын

Patreon games

@Megapixel8063

5 жыл бұрын

Probably has a job, plays D&D after work on weekdays then does two games a day on weekends.

@Tigercup9

5 жыл бұрын

I was going to say that the host provides snacks and drinks, so you could gorge yourself at your games in order to sustain yourself, except that as DM you’re probably hosting, so now you have to feed yourself AND 6 other people 10 times a week.

@LyndonGrimm

5 жыл бұрын

@@Tigercup9 In my game, I host and DM, Player's have to bring snacks and their own drinks. ( I only drink water with occasional beer so meh) They all understand I put way more time into their games than they do so yeah... they bring snacks.

In one of the games I'm playing in, I have a pet Faerie Dragon and her favorite prank is to "boop" people into the Ethereal Plane. So anytime someone misses a session, they've been booped.

To rule 1: Weeeeeell, my first game of D&D ever, I was the DM :D Got compliments for a great session and the campaign has been running more or less weekly for 8 months so far.

@naputidarrian

5 жыл бұрын

Riesenfriese ForeverDM Curse. I sympathize

@2MeterLP

5 жыл бұрын

@@naputidarrian Nah, not forever DM, we recently started a curse of strahd side campaign that one of my players DMs, so I can play too from time to time. I really enjoy being a DM though.

@holdge5382

5 жыл бұрын

As a person whose about to dm a game without a single trace of RPG experience, this comment relieve some of my stress.

@2MeterLP

5 жыл бұрын

@@holdge5382 Weeeell, I did watch about a combined hundred episodes of Critical Role and Acqusitions Inc before, so I wouldnt say I had zero experience with it. I recommend both shows, though of critical role id recommend campaign 2 more than 1.

@holdge5382

5 жыл бұрын

Riesenfriese Im watching critical role right now... Did you just read my mind you witch?!

Got a session today in an hour, this was perfectly timed. The party's visiting Waterdeep and I'm woefully unprepared.

@thebag3429

5 жыл бұрын

Pohatu Nuva remember waterdeep is basically new York. So if you ever need to improvise, just think what you would find in New York.

@JOHNMARTIN-zm6zz

5 жыл бұрын

Good luck.

As a DM my version of "The Giant Purple Baby" is that the players are "In the bathroom". It adds a little bit of comedy to a handwave explanation.

“You’re a DM, yes, but that does not automatically make you infallible or omniscient, nor should you be held up as such.” *scrolls past an image of Matt Mercer* ...Bad example.

@marcusalm7350

5 жыл бұрын

I saw it more as "Se this? You are not this. Don't expect to be this!"

@paradocks23

5 жыл бұрын

Good example. He's an excellent DM but he's still human and a lot of his knowledge comes from experience and prep time, but he also knows how to improv when he doesn't know something. He's fantastic, but not perfect. An awesome DM, but still human.

@theoneandonlymichaelmccormick

5 жыл бұрын

Paradox XXIV Thanks, dillweed. I guess I wasn’t making a joke after all.

@vinx.9099

5 жыл бұрын

he's a great DM, but in the relatively few hours of critical role i've watched i've seen him not know rules or remembered rules. doesn't make him a bad DM in any way, but does show he's doesn't know all the rules.

@zacharychaira808

4 жыл бұрын

@@marcusalm7350 yeah that's definitely how I saw it. 🤔 Still it could also likely be a sarcastic pun since that's about 70% of his vids. 😁

I actually do tpose for natural one, instead of trip

Wait, 9 games a week? HOW? One of my games is usually 14 to 21 o clock. Do you get some of your players to get up early in the morning to play?

@mahe4

5 жыл бұрын

i want to know too!

@Zenr0s

5 жыл бұрын

As a player of one of his games, we have no idea either lol.

@calvinbarboza

5 жыл бұрын

Plz give answers. Like the lowest estimate is 27 hours of GMing

@kyleabrams5036

5 жыл бұрын

That's like a full time job. I would start killing off parties just so I could be a player.

@iafozzac

5 жыл бұрын

If some are over the net he could make use of different timezones

The purple baby took my dm and hasn't brought him back in 2 months

So the advice I give to everyone running game: Ask these questions after every session. We called these the 3 questions, but question zero got added for the same reason Davvy added his rule zero (funny how that works). 0- Did you have fun? 1- What was your favorite Scene and why? 2- What was something I did as a GM that you liked? Something you disliked? 3- Was there an NPC you want to see more or less of? Question 0 and 1 are sometimes the only one you get a solid answer to. But hearing these explanations gives a great understanding of what your players want. What joy they are getting out of the game. And what things might be in your blind spot that piss them off. And it lets you get to know your players as people, which since this is a social medium, is very important.

I've only been DM'ing for about a year now, and honestly, Rule 0 is the *only* rule I'd say every DM absolutely needs to follow.

personally ive always used blink disease. its something that is caused by magic items witch were just made badly, and causes the party member to blink out of existence for a while, leaving the item behind. if the item is destroyed the party member is lost in the astral sea, but if the item is upgraded the party member gets a random stat up by +1. not the modifier, just the statistic

I call "The Giant Purple Baby" the "Dungeon Master Pocket Dimension where PCs go when They Aren't Here"

Weirdly enough, the more I watch your videos, the more I realize how much you look like a friend I had in high school. He was also a huge D&D dude, and was even the guy who got me into tabletop in the first place. Weird comment, I know, but your tips just reminded me of when he was teaching me how to DM. So now I'm having a nostalgia trip XD

"There is nothing wrong with jumping head first into the deep end and flapping your arms around to learn how to swim. The worst you can do is drown." -Davvy Chappy

4:20 just after talking about displaying deep knowledge of the English language, a picture of a book in French is shown ......

Here i thought purple baby was some sort of jojo reference..

@MrMagbrant

5 жыл бұрын

my dude, everything is a jojo reference, even when it's not.

@royalknightsleipmon2345

5 жыл бұрын

Nah man, the weird monster baby from part 6 was green.

@nick8402

5 жыл бұрын

Alex C he would have said something about pucci

@leguan278

5 жыл бұрын

*Purple baby takes partys only healer before a huge fight* OH NO!

@ataberkdedemen9802

5 жыл бұрын

Baby face

0:05 I came down with the flu a short while after I created that image, and seeing it appear in one of your videos might as well be my reward for powering through the worst of the symptoms over the following 10 days! (That and the patreon shout out, thank you so much!)

The make it up as you go along. Before, having a structured campaign. Put into place. Does flatten the learning curve for new DMs.

Yeee, these are good tips. The Best One: Dming takes practice DMING IS A SKILL, DONT QUIT AT BEING ONE! You will improve with time

Hey Davvy, I know you're prolly never gonna see this, but I love it, and I WANT TO SEE YOU DM. I would honestly pay to see your campaign live streamed or otherwise. I think you have a really fun style that I would be entertained by, and learn a lot from.

new warlock subclass idea: Giant Flying Purple Baby patron

@theguileraven7014

4 жыл бұрын

Clearly a great-old-one.

All classes can branch out to fufill specific sub-roles. *ESPECIALLY THE CLERIC*

Your advice is so great! I love the videos

Oh hey That last rule is interesting I had something similar for people who want to change their characters or not show up. The cavern tavren, a tavern that moves through the underground, collecting adventurers from their underground adventures. Assuming each session ends with the players finishing what they were doing in the dungeon, they have an excuse to stay in the tavern and not show up

Damn, perfect timing! I’m doin a session in less than 2 hours!

5:45 All hail the Almighty Purple baby, and his dangling apendages of kidnapping!

i actually completly read the dmg and phb. University sucks sometimes...

He mentioned Pathfinder. I'd really really like him to cover it aswell when he get's most of his D&D 5E stuff done. There is literally 10 years of content for Pathfinder 1E. It's a gold mine of infinite options and videos!

The purple baby was absolutely genius.

Davvy my dude, I want you to know how cool I think you are for doing the right thing about all the artwork shenanigans I've commented on previously, I'm really impressed with the way you've taken that criticism to heart and continued to make great content going forward. I think today's the day for me to be a cool guy, and though I can't afford to be a patron heres hoping maybe one day. Stay cool my dude!

DismalDirge, that is the best idea I've ever heard.

We always explained away missing party members as "he has dual bucket disease". Except for my Ravnica game. The party spent an ABNORMAL amount of time in trash cans already so every time someone was MIA I was like "he's in the dumpster"

Good job chappy. Keep up the awesomeness

Honestly davvy this really helped me feel better about being a DM and I'd like to say thank you ^^

Would love to see you DM a game and put it on the channel. I know it’s the main stream thing to do but I would really enjoy watching it.

Another very important thing that many DM’s forget, you are only one half of the equation. If your player’s aren’t happy then you have no power, and if you aren’t happy, the player’s have no power. An easy way to think about this, is that the same way that gods need worshippers for their power, the DM needs players to DM for, so KEEP YOUR PLAYERS HAPPY!! I don’t have little issues with the group I DM for because of how vehemently I follow this rule.

Instead of the flying thing, I just have the party vote on how the character shall act in combat. Out of combat I just have them as a meat puppet on the side

I have never played as a not DM. “Cries in dungeon”

The purple baby is going to save my campaign

davvy love your stuff you are great thanks budds

So, funny thing; awhile back I was on the d&d wiki looking at all the homebrew gods, looking for a homebrew version of an older edition deity that didn't have 5e info yet, and saw the giant flying purple baby. Let me tell you, even with the context provided on the page, that was a hell of a trip. it is very strange to be running into it again over a year later.

Honestly fantastic

OMG TY FOR HEARING MY PRAYERS!

I love that "Smart D&D stuff / Dumb D&D Stuff" at the beginning by 2 favorite channels are you and XP to LV 3

OBVIOUSLY U POST THIS VIDEO LITERALLY 40 minutes *AFTER* SESSION 0 OF MY FIRST SERIOUS CAMPAIN

Loki: If you need a guide to Earth i have some experience in that regard. Thanos: If you consider failure experience. Loki: i consider Experience Experience

Hold on, 9 games a week??? Davy fuckin chappy literally making his whole life revolve around D&D and Ive never been more proud. Bards best boy

0:40 I legit had to pause to get the joke here, but when I did, I made a f*cking evil laugh that made my mom come to my room just to check if I was okay.

When I first started DM'ing I found it awkward and was having a slightly hard time playing the NPCs. I could change my voice slightly and put on a small persona but only because it was some of my best friends I was playing with. I never really went all out though and only made my voice slightly ligher/rougher or changed my speech patterns a bit...Now my favorit NPC to play is an annoying little goblin with long fingers that constantly scream and screech and the ultimate gay elf that is about as flamboyant as a flamingo wearing a speedo and a boa necklace that match its feathers....and I find it to be some of the best fun I have ever had playing these characters and my players absolutely love them as well. Sometimes just really getting out there and trying to leave your comfort zone. Thanks to that I feel way more confident in pretty much anything I do..because if I can make the most idiotic joke character somehow become so engaging I can make the scary characters actually intimidating. And looking at my player's reactions to one of the bad guys I made a while back..it is working and I am loving every second of it!

I will make a cleric worshipping the purple baby, all hail!

There aren’t any DMs were I live and all the online games seem to always be fulI, so I had to study like crazy to start a dnd group and have now become a constant dm. Would definitely want to be a player for training purposes, tho. The current (and my first) campaign is chaos as it ended up being 8 players joining it... However it has gone better with each session as I constantly consume dnd podcasts and until I can round up some rules by the top of my head. Also went better when I just split the party in two perfectly handled parties of 4. Still chaos, tho. Really hope to learn more so players of mine can enjoy a good game. Really love these vids and they really help a lot when studying the art of DnD.

Good DM tips from the cutest DM around.

This was useful but it would of been better if I had this before throwing myself in a group of 10 people for a "one shot" that has now turned into a campaign.

9 CAMPAIGNS A WEEK?? HOW THE HELL DO YOU HAVE THE STAMINA/WILLPOWER TO KEEP ALL THAT UP???

@pohatunuva3771

5 жыл бұрын

He's probably got some short online ones.

@Christian-vq3lr

5 жыл бұрын

Or he doesn’t do the 8 hour meetings, but like 3 - 5 hour meetings

My characters zone out and stare at a tree, lurking behind the party in a Slenderman fashion

Thank you for the advice! As a brqnd new DM videos like this are very helpful. My only worry is that I have never been a player. My entire group is brand new to DM, none of us played before this. I chose to be the DM to get the game going and one of us had to be it if we wanted to play. So I'm trying to imagine it from their persepctive I just don't have thay experience, mostly cause none of us do.

@zeinsg7063

5 жыл бұрын

Maxamumdes I am in the exact same position, first three sessions consisted of just explaining the concept of DnD. Then the next one helping 7 different people make their very first character at the same time. Never been a player and probably never will be.

@MrMaxamumdes

5 жыл бұрын

@@zeinsg7063 Yeah, I swear if it wasn't for Matt Colville and his videos I would be so lost on what I was doing in the first place. I hope it works out for you though!

@zeinsg7063

5 жыл бұрын

Maxamumdes Thanks man, good luck on your DMing adventures too.

My little sister had problems playing one night for personal reasons. So I took here aside and had I one person session later where her character learned important things about the campaign it was pretty sweet highly recommend doing something similar

I like the DM first rule make sure your players have fun

I’m using the giant purple baby. I used to have people get transported into the AIR PLANE, a massive Boeing 747 eternally flying through he plane of elemental air. People would randomly fall into and out of it through randomly appearing magical portals. Nevertheless, the baby is superior. All praise the baby.

Hey, would love it if you made a guide to phionic disciplins and which are 3 davy heads.

NINE. GAMES. A. WEEK. WTF??!?

Yeah my DM has an in party NPC to help us understand each other (my characters mute and another character has very slurred common) and to help out with story stuff.

Considering the Purple Baby, I think the absence of players is cetrainly annoying, especially for inexperienced groups. However, it can be used as a storytelling device. In Critical Role, they have used this absence several times to flesh out a character without them being there. One session that immediately comes to mind was relatively early into campaign 1, where Taliesin, the player, was absent during his own arc and the session just before that, the party had come face to face with the people that killed his PC's family, but the baddies managed to escape. He locked himself in his workshop for 3 in game days, not wanting to talk to anyone, just trying to deal and calming down, while the rest of the party went on a little side quest, and when the player came back the next session, they could pick up right where they had left off. And of course, one of their players, Ashley, was and is regularily absent because she's filming a show, and because she plays a cleric, the in universe explanation is that she often stays behind to help rebuilding a destroyed town or temple and being a beacon of hope to the populous. And when she has time to play for a session while her character and the party are in completely different places, she astral projects herself to her friends with the help of her goddess and comes to their aid, which has made for more than one fantastic entrance where she saved the day in a pinch. It can be a fantastic storytelling device if done right.

that's so simple, yet so true!

ALL HAIL THE PURPLE BABY!

Thank you davvy

You should collab with jake and the xp to lv 3 peeps

Davvy: I run 9 games a week. Me: Is it possible to learn this power?

Yeah for the "purple baby" situation I have run campaigns where its sort of common knowledge that the campaign is basically a MMORPG, with players just spawning in and out on a whim. The remaining party members just sort of shrug it off.

Some good advice.

I love XP's reply "Dumb DnD Stuff"

No. 3 is some good ASMR sh*t yeah buddy.

I wanted you to know that after showing my dm this video, he has since started using the giant flying purple baby whenever a player can't make it so take that victory as you will King

Ayy pathfinder shoutout!

I would love a WoD (especially Garou) video!

I love how Davvy has a super small, super loyal fanbase that watches all the videos as soon as possible. But nobody is a semi fan.

Davvy your a credit to our race👊

How do you make a warlock bard

Praise the baby!

the like is for the tweeter screenshot

Wait, was that necklace in that picture of you of the zerg symbol?

Holy hell that's a lot of games.

9 games EVERY WEEK! Umbrella how do you make/find the time? & how do you keep that we'll full?

My friends are doing a d&d campaign idk if i wana do it or not because the new pepole might go crazy 😔

I think we have a better version of the purple baby. In my game we have on player who is on and off so she plays a narcoleptic gnome that we just say is asleep. It also adds challenges that you don’t get with a purple baby.

0:24 *Hears WORLD OF DARKNESS* when you run out of stuff to talk about for D&D and start making WoD content I may consider becoming a Patron, my Chappy fellow.

Been wait for daddy Chappy dm tips

usually when my players aren't there they just fall unconscious as if they died in skyrim or something and then they regain consciousness when they're back.

I'm trying to get into D&D, but have never played before, and don't know of any groups in the area. Any tips?

I want your 10$ tier to open up... 4 questions: if/when it opens up, will it be offered to the current 5$ patrons first? Is there a priority list one can sign onto? If no, can I be first? And is it looking like, currently, either is going to open up anytime soon?

What would you do if you, as a new dm, want to do stuff one way but then a veteran player says you have to do it another way? I mean he is more experienced and knows the rules better than you, but should you just go with whatever the veteran says or hold your ground? (example: i had a monster hidden underground and it would try to grab a person that would come near it and pull it underground. I thought a dex save would make the most sense, but the ambushed veteran said it was technically a grapple and so it would be athletics against the monsters strength. I went with the players suggestion, but afterwards i felt like i shouldn't have done that.)

You run more games then days of the week - my god

Pls make a video on world of darkness

PRAISE THE PURPLE BABY

@ahappyjackolantern

5 жыл бұрын

Idk how good an idea it is to ask the KZread comment section for advice, but I kinda like the purple baby idea, especially considering how many of my DND sessions get canceled because one out of six people had to cancel. The problem is that most of the time when someone has to cancel it’s the one dude that would get unbelievably pissed if we played ANY D&D when he wasn’t present. Therefore, I find myself with a conflict of Rule 0, where it wouldn’t be fun for said guy if we did the purple baby rule when he’s busy, but it’s also less fun for the rest of my players if we cancel just because one dude can’t make it. Thoughts, DMs?

YES THE PURPLE BABY