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@GameNightTV

4 жыл бұрын

Perfect timing gentlemen! Game Night is wrapping up our first campaign after a year of gaming together! I'm working on our last four sessions right now!

The first 2 minutes felt like my parents getting divorced

@ryangudger91

4 жыл бұрын

IDK again

@joshfase9324

4 жыл бұрын

At least this time it wasn't your fault.

@hydrainfernos9081

4 жыл бұрын

Josh Fase dude too far

@johnsnow9210

4 жыл бұрын

@@joshfase9324 😱 lol, burn

@AnEnemySpy456

4 жыл бұрын

I always like to believe that people who get along on camera all secretly despise each other.

I identify with the tooth-pulling nature of trying to get constructive feedback so much.

@jensovadina5954

4 жыл бұрын

Me too. Its So So hard to get players to Tell You

@yipyipyipi

4 жыл бұрын

Try asking pointed questions rather than "what did you think". Odds are you know where you were struggling, and where you think you did well. So if you think you struggled with the mystery of the second act but think your boss fight at the end knocked it out of the park, see if they do too. Start the conversation. Try "hey, dod you guys understand the mystery was meant to be like an investigation? I don't know how well I dropped the hints" or "what did you guys like best about the boss fight?"

@MrTinygod

4 жыл бұрын

If you're up front with your players and don't do anything shady then you should just be able to ask them and they should be able to give you the information you're looking for without worrying about consequences

@VidelxSpopovich

4 жыл бұрын

@@jensovadina5954 Meanwhile, I will tell my DM point blank how I feel about how he did after a game... though generally that's because I have criticisms that I think they should hear since the rest of the players will just kiss his ass and tell him he did amazing because they don't know any better being new and all.

@claytongrey988

4 жыл бұрын

I relate to a lot of these replies, as a DM I have two key phrases: 'I challenge you to' and 'I invite you to'. E.g. 'I challenge you to give me one negative' seems to really get people out of their comfort zone, and it helps everyone start to picture what they want in the next campaign.

"I was going to do it anyway" is the real life version of "it's what my character would do."

“Sorry I’m not a college graduate” made me laugh so hard

I wanna talk about how my friend, player, and Dm ends his sessions, and how this method has come to be the end of EVERY session of every game I run or participate in. At the end of each session we have a roundtable, where everyone, player and Dm says one or two things about each other player that they liked or enjoyed from their play. It can be as simple as 'you dealt a fuck ton of damage in that fight' or as indepth as 'the argument over the morality that our characters had was so intense, are we actually cool irl?' (both are examples from my games). It ends the game on a very nice night and gives some real positive encouragement to players.

@WebDM

4 жыл бұрын

That's lovely!!

(to the tune of the tmnt theme) high-concept pontification, *high-concept pontification*

I use the end of Jojo “to be continued” meme with roundabout as a general template on when to end a session on a cliffhanger or a good beat

@alexanderchippel

3 жыл бұрын

That's all fine and dandy until Last Train Home starts playing. Or worse... What A Wonderful World...

Opening skit was amazing. Had me in tears. "It's not like I'm flying across the damn country to shoot these shows"....and the "sorry I'm not a college graduate" 1-2 punch had me in stitches. Well done, gentlemen!

I've usually ended campaigns by asking how their characters go back to their lives. The characters have spent usually months to years on the road, saving the world, collecting gold. Having them describe to me allows them to have their characters get a satisfactory ending, plus our campaigns are all on a timeline. I can use their endings to potentially mention them in another campaign. For example, I'm running a mash up of Hoard of the Dragon Queen/Rise of Tiamat, with Storm Kings Thunder and Dragon Heist. However, when I was a player during a previous HotDQ/RoT, my old character retired. He opened a tavern in Waterdeep, and the previous party became the new Council of Dragons in Waterdeep. Now 40 years later, my character still has influence as a hero, and is helping guide the new party

I’ve strictly used what you’ve described as “serial” sessions because I never played in or watched a game where the group did anything else! I used one long downtime break in my last home brew campaign, but I’m definitely going to start using shorter downtime breaks between sessions!

When Jim stormed off I was like “he’s...he’s coming back right?!” I need my Pruitt with a side of Davis!!!

@rpm297

4 жыл бұрын

Or do we need our Davis with a side a Pruitt?

@quaz_zee

4 жыл бұрын

Touché

Wow, this came out when my group is about 2 sessions away from finishing off the campaign. Good timing.

@blakhart1990

4 жыл бұрын

Sam Hixson tonight’s our last session!

@GameNightTV

4 жыл бұрын

Four sessions left for us!

@ryangudger91

4 жыл бұрын

I’m kill my group with Tiamat on Saturday I imagine that will be the end

@pencilbender

4 жыл бұрын

@@ryangudger91 haha holy shit

@jonbona876

4 жыл бұрын

4 sessions for my group. I am sad to see this go, almost 3 great years.

I think my favourite character death was one that technically didn’t happen. I was in a 40K: Deathwatch game, playing a Space Marine Librarian called Zahriel, and our kill team was clearing a hive city and found ourselves in a big boss battle where the bad guy summoned a greater daemon. We held it off for a while, gradually beating it down, two of the other characters being horribly killed in the process. Another dropped moments later, grievously wounded, leaving Zahriel as the last one standing. He raised his force sword, hurling his most potent psychic power at the daemon, killing it... but he’d hit a peril of the warp. (I can’t remember now whether it was a house rule or not - it’s been a while - but we ran perils so they could occur on both pass and fail.) I picked up he dice to see what peril we’d get. It could have been just a gust of wind or an ominous flickering. But it wasn’t. Casting that blast of psychic energy opened a rent into the Empyrean... and another greater daemon lumbered out. There was little doubt that Zahriel would be slaughtered, joining the component parts of his comrades (and a few dozen renegade guardsmen) on the bloody floor, but it would take a while. Zahriel squared up to the daemon, reloading his pistol and raising his sword... ...and the GM called time. It was late. That was maybe six years ago. The group fell apart - our schedules just didn’t fit at all, one was always travelling on business, and getting to anyone’s house was a nuisance. We talked about having a quick one-off session just to see how long Zahriel could hold out and if the mortally wounded marine would be able to recover, but it never happened. But somewhere, Zahriel is still standing there, bloodied and exhausted, not yet dead, existing in a warp-torn state of limbo between glorious, against-the-odds triumph and horrid, messy, corrupting oblivion. He stands there still, one last noble bulwark against the horrors of Chaos, and he will stand his lonely watch until his character sheet sees daylight once more. Only in death does duty end.

How weird was it to Role-play the "Break up"?

You mentioned it in the video, but would it be possible to have you guys discuss ending campaigns in greater focus? Concluding a campaign in a satisfying, intentional way is difficult. It's also not that common, which unfortunately means there are very few resources available to new DM's hoping to end their campaign with grace. Everything from epilogues and final scenes, to send-offs, character wish-fulfillment, and even discussions after the campaign, all play big roles in putting a wrap on an adventure that you and your friends might have spent ages on. I'd love to hear your takes on them.

All of my campaigns have come to an end when enough of the players can't make sessions anymore, or we get excited about starting a new campaign. Things are usually left off after a major story beat though, so it feels like it "peters out" instead of stopping in the hallway right before the final boss fight. Also that ending card at 37:08 is perfect for making it look like you guys are just animatronic puppets doing the show, which is what you were probably going for.

start show with drama then philosophy on the concept of time noice

I've retired one character. My wood elf druid Felisin, who got to level 4, contracted werebear lycanthropy and decided to spend his days running a lodge in Homlett under the tutelage of Jaroo until he had it all under control again and could head back to his people, his wanderlust now fulfilled.

@MrKarma-dp8ud

4 жыл бұрын

NeflewitzInc I just imagine them saying “ I’m DISEASED, it’s time to leave!! If I hadn’t left home, then I wouldn’t have been DISEASED, so I’M STAYING HOME!!”

Pruitt you can’t just casually drop “I made iron man and it actually worked” without linking the character sheet!

@SetzerValorin

4 жыл бұрын

Seems like a good start would be Guild Artisan (weaponsmith) background, Cleric of the Forge with a dip or two into Warlock and/or Sorcerer.

@calvinbarboza

4 жыл бұрын

He has talked about before on multiple episodes, Antonia Stark an Evocation Wizard/Tempest Cleric. His prepared spells showed up on armor’s HUD.

@dylandugan76

4 жыл бұрын

Fighter 2/ Artificer (Artillerist) 12/ Wizard (War) 6. You're welcome.

@cynicalswordmage6699

4 жыл бұрын

@@dylandugan76 the real mvp out here

@dylandugan76

4 жыл бұрын

@@cynicalswordmage6699 Take some of the Wizard levels fairly early if you want the Fly spell before the late game. As long as you start as a Fighter, your proficiencies will be fine.

For those that are interested in the character arcs such as the ones mentioned in Invisible Sun, Monte Cook Games put a generic version of it in their 'Your Best Game Ever' book.

That opening hit a little too close to home.

@WilliamSlayer

4 жыл бұрын

IKR

I haven't seen Jim this animated and spicy since the Gods/Pantheon episode. Watch out!

“Part of the journey is the end. “ And a good end can say and do more for you then all the good beginnings and nice middles ever can.

What a time for this video to come out, thanks Web DM.

@WebDM

4 жыл бұрын

Glad to help!

I wish my group could stay together long enough to actually finish and adventure let alone a whole campaign

Guys, Guys, how dare you nail every. single. intro?!

This past weekend I got to have a really good session ending. My players had just taken down an adult black dragon and there were at a dinner celebrating when a bloody soldier came bursting into the hall and said, “Sire we’re under attack.” And that’s where I ended the session. It felt really good.

@WebDM

4 жыл бұрын

Ooh good one!

Some campaigns just peter out with a whimper. Some end in a blaze of glory.

Crushed it on the timing! I have 3-4 sessions left in my campaign before everyone has to split up and stop playing for a long time... I didn’t want to put it on hiatus like last year

@WebDM

4 жыл бұрын

Let us know how it goes!

The recent ending of our year-long campaign was amazing. Basically it turned into a "Captain America: Civil War" situation, where the party was split, fighting over the fate of one of our players. Our party split up after he escaped, some setting out to try to find him, others going to try to protect him. It was amazing! We are going to check in with the members down the line at some point, but this was a good ending point.

That was a BEAUTIFUL analog fade to black!

I'd love a whole video on ending campaigns. I am running my first ever game and I am using the "Tyranny of Dragons" modules as the backbone. We are probably only a handful of sessions away from the party facing off with Tiamat so any more insight on ending a campaign would be great!

I love episodic games. Serialized games are nice and all, but some of my most satisfying gaming sessions have been episodic. Episodic games do tend to be a bit more linear, but that's fine is you can have a good dungeon crawl or a solid story with a simple beginning, middle and end.

“How to end a campaign is tough, we could do a whole show on it”. True story Jim. :)

Oh my god. That intro was a fantastic idea, but it hurt my soul to watch (don't worry I watched it a lot to be sure). Please don't ever end Web DM

I love these two grown men. I would love to sit around a table and learn from their wisdom, bask in their humour and generally just enjoy their company all the whilst playing DnD.

@WebDM

4 жыл бұрын

Thank you so much! Live near Tucson, AZ or Philadelphia? Guys will be at Rincon in Tuscon and PAX Unplugged in Philly later this year

@My_Toy_Soldiers

4 жыл бұрын

@@WebDM only about 5,000 miles away. I'm in England 😂

@pencilbender

4 жыл бұрын

@@My_Toy_Soldiers time to book a plane boiz

Dear god! That intro is an actual conversation between my brother and I. I literally laughed out loud. Love this intro as well!

Man, we had our last session for our campaign 3 days ago. Shoot

@WebDM

4 жыл бұрын

How'd it go?

@palazard95

4 жыл бұрын

Actually pretty well. Talked with each player in the weeks leading up on how they want loose threads tied up, and where they all wanted to be after 100 years.

definitely gonna have to agree with pruitt's explanation of time here. Time is to movement as color is to light, it's an illusion that we use to help us navigate reality

In the campaign I play we retired our characters at 5th level. We jumped the clock forward ten years and got to see the fruits of the parties choices. New arc has new characters with last arc filling as NPCs. :) very fulfilling! My favorite touch is the boulder that crit my level 1 character, since then its had the names of a few others etched into it. Cool custom motif.

Hey guys, I really can't thank you enough for the advice in this video. I have long struggled with long form/endless/1-20 campaigns as a DM because it always just feels like too much and that in 3 years of dming I haven't really honed in my style. It had never occurred to me to put a set end point on a campaign early on, and that realisation has really helped me to realise what sort of DM I am and how I can refine my style. I genuinely feel more excited about dming than I have for ages, thank you so much!

@WebDM

3 жыл бұрын

Aww thank you!

I have to say, im a bit late to the video but i found you guys when back when there was like 20k subs and i was looking for help and tips for starting my first times DMing. i started my first long form game (started with a module) in 2017 and this year in October we finally ended. Thank you guys so much for the help and the continued help as i start my next game with my own homebrew world!

Another great video, I particularly like the section on retiring characters. I think the best example of an ending-safe campaign I've witnessed was one where the DM planned everything in short 3-6 session arcs so players only had to commit for around a month at a time (they might get more than one game in a week). By bringing characters back each arc, or introducing new ones as old ones step out or are killed, they were able to string those short arcs together into a campaign that lasted a couple of years and still ended satisfactorily without the need for some grand finale.

Thank you Pruitt, time is as objectively real as color is, it is entirely a qualia. Time the experience of continuous cascading motion, in no way can it be used to measure or modify spacial dimensions

I retired a gnome rogue (ex-pirate) in a way that surprised the DM. Like we planned the idea of the main npc sending him on a private mission. he got a ship and communication device and told where to go but when he got far enough away he threw the device into the ocean and just sailed off into the sunset. It just made more sense for him to bail because for a while I’d been wondering why he was sticking around

@rileedavis397

4 жыл бұрын

The problem with that is you denied the DM and his NPCs the right to defend against deception checks you should have been required to make when you planned to betray that NPC and steal his ship / resources / what-have-you. At the very least the DM should have retroactively made some checks for you and if the NPC won them, had more repercussions awaiting you for this betrayal than you expect.

I love how jim always repeats what pruitt says

Thank you for the perfect timing of your video! My campaign of 18 months is going to end in the next session, and I still need to prep for it!!

@WebDM

4 жыл бұрын

Let us know how it goes!

I ran a Spacemaster: Privateers campaign that I put a lot of effort into to learn how to make 3-D stellar maps and solar systems, and learned about the Roche radius and the importance of large satellites to stabilize axial tilt enough to allow evolution of advanced life, and how to run 3-D Newtonian space combat, and, and, and... - Two of my player were deeply into improving their ship and their available tech to the point that they essentially assassinated the ruling cast of the enemy star empire with a from-light-years distant surface strike, and I ended the campaign with a short story, including what each character went on to do. - - - Mased on what some of the players wrote/described, I have the availability of a new campaign like the second season of Buck Rogers when they went out into the stars on The Searcher under Admiral Efram Asimov. - - - My current fantasy campaign, inspired in part by Divinity II and the movies Deep Impact/Armageddon and some Diablo thrown in for the foes. I think I may end that with a player victory if they win, or a migration through a magical gate to one or more new worlds if they lose.

One of my characters (Celestial Warlock) had a pact with a celestial which commanded him to go out and destroy undead and other evil, he had this pact because he was deathly sick and din't wanted to die. Later in the campaign he died and was brought back under the pact of an archfey who needed him at that moment and didn't care else what he would do, so he literally left the game and went back to his family. I didn't want to but it kinda made all the sense.

This was the funniest post credit so far. Very appropriate.

Good timing, we just wrapped up dungeon of the mad mage last night after 10 months.. had some interesting discussions at the end :)

This was top-notch!

i have done a starting level 5-20 session and it was utterly satisfying as it was all natural and my gaming group seem to be able to pull it off more then once a (so far in our second game together it is really working out)it makes coming back to the table with those same people so much more special then starting the first time.

Less than three minutes in and Jim references the eternal recurrent. This is gonna be a good episode.

I literally JUST listened to the episode of Land Between Two Rivers that Jim mentioned in this episode, and I'm SO glad I made it there because that spoiler might have killed me.

Outstanding Jim Davis

Pretty sure Jim nailed the universe and its relation to time...at least as far as I know.

My group really do have trouble playing sequential campaigns, so I've taken to running a lot of episodic campaigns. Maybe my favorite campaign I've ever run is an episodic StarTrek-esque campaign called 'Planet of the Week', but I also run an episodic TSR Marvel game. I would recommend it; it takes so much pressure off me as a GM, and lends the campaign to much more variety.

"I'm gonna try to defeat the big bad and amass a boatload of treasure and magic items." "You're trying to engineer a predetermined scenario in what should be a natural, random situation!"

Woo, view number 5! And good timing guys I have a campaign that I'm about to end.

My favorite character was retired the same way Pruitt's Stark character did. He was a bard who went into the wilds to form a town with an adventuring party and create a grand tavern there. Along the way he nearly died 9 times, 5 of which were being swarmed by an endless horde of zombies in the basement of a wizard's tower. I decided that he was incredibly shaken by the ordeal and hung up his adventuring career to focus on his tavern. I thought it was a good send off for this character. DM apparently didn't though and next session an ally betrayed us, killed my character off-screen, and razed the town we created. He never told me he was killing my dude off. I was pissed at first but I rolled with it. When the party tried to resurrect him I said the bard's soul refused to come back; he found peace at last in death and didn't want to suffer anymore. When the paladin investigated my corpse he found the reason why he even went out adventuring in the first place: an old love letter from another bard he met at his college, with a vow written on the back to make a better place for them.

Really love this video however I would really love a more DM specific advice video. Jim's advice on what you need to write a one-shot and what needs to happen in order for the story to feel satisfying. Does there need to be a big final fight? I find it easy enough to end a session when the story is going to continue but when we reach the end of my written adventures there is often a "what's next?" "And then?" Dude where's my car moment where i then ultimately have to say "NO AND THEN!"

I like the idea of finishing your motivation and retiring from adventuring, but I also like the idea of finishing your motivation and continuing because during the process you found new reasons to continue. New friends and family, or new threats to the world that need to be thwarted. It definitely depends on the character and the game.

I just lost my first Warhammer Fantasy character this week, and it's both been coming to this for weeks if not months and also perhaps meant to be something more dramatic. Ulrich Boesch was just a local nuisance for the town watch to keep an eye on while he tried to convince folk of the ratmen in the sewers. A few harrowing adventures later, he's got himself acid spit, warty skin, both a firebug and a doom-themed insanity, as well as a total shift of perspective after shifting from talking to others about the threats to the Empire, to actually doing something about them and bearing the scars of those encounters on his body, mind, and soul. The little small-town agitator had gotten himself into zealothood for Sigmar and Ulric united, and he took each near-death experience as a new trial meant to shape him into their ideal vessel. I love the idea of a character being satisfied with what they've done and then just going off to live their lives relatively contented, but for Ulrich Sigmarsson the Twice-Burnt, Son of Sigmar and Ulric, there wasn't going to be an end anymore, and he knew that. After the things he'd seen and the delusions he'd accepted as a calling from the gods, he had come to see himself as already dead, a vessel dangling on the strings of those watching over him. Of course, after getting one-shot by a goblin shaman's fireball and getting sprayed with a ratman's warpfire thrower, blood loss was what ultimately finished him, with his last moments being bleeding out, cold on the ground while the rest of his party surrendered to the diseased cultists that had them severely outnumbered. It spelled certain death for him to have resisted, but there was no other path for him. I'm satisfied with it, even if it was relatively anti-climactic. I also agree very much on random tables. I go so far as to random-roll 3 characters for a given system, connect all the results to get a feel for who each one is in a general sense, and then pick whichever one I'm most fond of or whoever fits the given situation best. Random tables in that sense can really be fun for me, even if it's just to see what kind of lasting wound I'm gonna carry or if I immediately vomit and pass out from drinking something close to pure ethanol.

Hey guys!! I totally agree with the last part of the episode -- it was as soon as my players and I realized we had only a few weeks left that our campaign really tightened and had the best ending. I think a great way to execute a limited time frame was looking at how many sessions (roughly) we had left, and then planning one or two big events for each session that would build to the finale. If we couldn't meet one week (or if we could meet for an unexpected session) I'd adjust the amount of content and add/subtract the events I had planned. This is true for if the energy is low or unexpected plots come up -- either add in exciting encounters or cut something to flesh out the turns in the story so nothing's rushed. They were able to slay the god of the yuan'ti and banish their civilization backwards in time in a classic large-scale ending. We all wrote epilogues of when they returned from their adventures and everyone is thinking about what happens next if we all come together again. Happy gaming!

End a campaign with a resolution, a session with a cliffhanger and a character with ... look sometimes this stuff just _happens,_ okay? Stop looking at me like that.

Episodic style can be good for groups where certain players may not be in the next session. So even if they miss a time with the group they may have missed an episode but then they can play that into their character having to interact with the other characters about what they missed while they were doing said thing that made them miss the last episode.

What great timing. I'm thinking of retiring my changeling bard for my dragon marked rogue in an Eberron game. She's got every reason to leave, and he's got every reason to stick around (if only to keep the others in line). I'll be sad to see her go since I didn't get to play her long, but I think it just works better for the character.

My undergrad degree is Philosophy. Please do another existential opening.

@spiritchannels

4 жыл бұрын

I'm so sorry.

Very useful, please do more.

@WebDM

4 жыл бұрын

K

I engineered a character death in the second major mission of a campaign with my DM just because I thought it would make for good storytelling with where we were (and with a few new people at the table I knew he wasn’t going to let anyone just die in combat) and it impacted the players so severely that 2 of the girls made comic panels of his death scene for me. It was one of our favorite moments at the table. Not everyone should engineer their character’s death and certainly doing it all of the time would spoil the moments, but done effectively and working with the right DM, character deaths can be some of the best moments in all of D&D.

3:58 - 4:30 As a former member of a dead NWN PW (points if those letters mean something to you), I really felt that. After a long series of squib endings to various arcs, the site just ran out of donors, cutting off the last yearly site event. People just stopped showing up.

Gotta love Jim dropping the Nietzschean/Eastern influenced view of time and existence right off the bat lol

At 12:05 I did this in my CoS campaign when had a player leaving. They made it to vallaki and met strahd face to face. Strahd said something in Draconic to the dragonborn then left. A short while later the dragonborn just got up and left the inn and disappeared into a thunderstorm. One of the other players volunteered to dm another campaign for a bit so I can take a break from dming so CoS is hanging on that moment

OMG that intro was painfully accurate. Married happily 15 years ;)

We ended my first campaign with a big old army clash combined with a Tarrasque battle, cliche but we all enjoyed it to the fullest

I appreciate the advice on this episode. I've only had one good send of so far (I dm). But it's hard getting a good season ending when your players spend an hour in real time looting the bodies and looking for stufff....oh help me....

My campaign usually goes to the 40th level, and becoming a god, or a great king by having copper dragons you allied with throughout the game create a massive continent. You could also have then lead a colonization effort on a long forgotten continent, or just have them explore the multiverse.

As someone who has had most of their campaigns end with a TPK or peter out, it has been quite satisfying to have some end in a more organic manner (one of those wasn't even decided by me, but entirely by the players) in more recent history. I hope the beginnings Bringer starts with some kind of "Interview" process, faux representation of Davis and Pruitt meeting for the first time, or a cinematic recreation of the Web DM idea first being recreated. The implications of that Stinger tho...

I finished Storm Kings Thunder with the PCs finding a chest in Imryths horde that they had agreed to find and return to a Rakshasa and inside was a bunch of crying soul coins - Syrinscape provided the screams and calls of the dammed of the souls - Enter Avernus - players loved it.

I have talked about this character before, but he had my favorite examples of retiring a character. *WARNING THIS WILL HAVE MENTIONS SUICIDE* *NO ONE WAS HARMED THIS IS ALL CHARACTER ARK IN PRINCES OF THE APOCOLYPSE.* Shamash Clethintendor is a Gold Dragon born who comes from a society where Dragonborn hatchlings will be bought out by who ever has the money to be trained as a mindless soldier. Shamash was bought by the royal family of silvery moon to protect their youngest daughter (Another PC in the party.) His whole life and up bringing was to serve her. Another PC by the name of Geralt is everything the opposite of Shamash, not to mention is a tiefling. Shamash saw him as a person who will betray the party and should never be given the opportunity to get behind the parties back. Many times Shamash would risk his life to save the princess to prove he was a better weapon and resource then Geralt. Many times, however, Geralt would be seen as the better weapon. So after a fight with a shadow dragon, the abomination of dragon kin which Shamash felt hate for, Geralt got the last blow which had proven once again that he was the better weapon. This made Shamash go into a state of self doubt and a loss of purpose. No matter what he did, geralt could do it better. So, next to the shadow dragons remains he took his blade and did the ritual of disemboweling himself. The princess tried to stop him, but Shamash was too quick and he died. I talked to my DM about how I was possibly going to retire Shamash months before this happened. I wanted to do this to get a dramatic reaction out of my fellow players, And it worked! The player playing the princess said they nearly broke down into tears, which made me as a story teller feel a sense of accomplishment. Shamash did end up returning through an unknown source but was retired again when I had to leave the group. This time he was going to stop a rag tag team of idiots who were going to challenge the fire cult. That was summer of 2018 when I last played him, and he had some the best moments as a player I ever had. His beginings, his ups and downs, and his temporary endings.

I specifically planned out a character death from level 1 with a friend. He, the PC, had a great idea for a character, but it didn't come on-line until level 3 and he didn't want to play a "mostly-useless" (his words) character for the first handful of sessions. He, one week later, retconned what we had planned by explaining in a stroke of genius "What if my PC *is* my glaive?" The idea of having a cursed weapon be a player's true PC was so novel and mind-blowing to me that I immediately lost all hesitation and anxiety towards the pre-played, "scripted" dragon death. If your PCs got a great idea for a character, as a DM try and find a way to make it work. My player's PC is an ancient gnome artificer (-1300DR) that has become trapped in his own creation and steals the lifeforce of any character that dies while wielding this glaive (unintentionally) and grants small buffs, weapon profs, prof in the most used skill, or another language to the new user. All while trying find a way to escape and end his torment/existence.

At one point I had a player who died after falling 90 feet and then having a abominable yeti fall 90 feet onto him

I always end my sessions going around the table, asking the Players: Give me your favorite character moment. Give me your favorite story moment. (it cannot be their own character for either of these things). I give bonus XP or inspiration if your character was mentioned in this, but it always keep the conversation going.

@WebDM

4 жыл бұрын

Fantastic

I believe the word Jim was looking for is "denouement".

The worsts endings for campaigns is when you haven’t played for a few weeks and as the dm you say well it’s done in the middle of an adventure

I think players will remember more through their life 14 to 18 campaigns, with more intensity and challenges, than a never ending campaing.

I was doing a long running campaign for Call of Cthulhu. Around the end of the summer one friend said they would not be able to play for a while, another was gone quite a bit. The other two, though consistent felt that I was struggling to hold the group together. We ended up dissolving, with the idea we will get back together in October for the conclusion. School got in the way for me and we never got together again. My best friend and I were talking about it at work recently and she told me that she still wants to know the ending tho that group is likely not to reform. It sucks when there is no conclusion.

Those first 3 minutes were a very unexpected trip.

Our campaigns typically end with one overly ambitious character convincing the party that they can handle something that there is no reason to believe they should. Example: A Loxodon Paladin that got the party of 2 Wizards, a Cleric, and a Rouge of level 6 to go purge the neighboring kingdom of an Ancient Blue Dragon. It went as well as you would expect.

Thanks webDM!

@WebDM

4 жыл бұрын

Thanks Joshua!

I only have one completed campaign under my belt and the sorcerer is still mad at me for soul trapping him in the last episode.

I have, for sure, allowed a blaze of glory ending for multiple characters. And it is silly because it's not random, but the other players were awestruck that the character died since they weren't let in on the plan

I would love to use the Arcs paradigm with the milestones system in dnd 5th to have all experience be earned through that

I was thinking of this subject recently when watching a recent episode of critical role, because for me a few of the characters don’t really have any real motivation to stay in the party and the ones they do have are flimsy at best

I'd really like to see an episode on fame and notoriety that covers how to handle when your PC' become well known in the game world

@WebDM

4 жыл бұрын

Thank you for the suggestion!

"From the hell world we find ourselves in" posted in 2019. You poor innocent souls.

idk i came up with a story that this main bbeg hired lower bbegs to find parts to this stave and when all the parts are collected they will meet up and place the parts together and then the main bbeg will set the weakened god of death free and then consume him and his power but the players got to stop him before he gets all the pieces

My group has never been very good at ending sessions at predetermined times. We usually just meet up and keep going until we're hardly coherent anymore and might end after a combat encounter.