0:00

Today on the Lazy RPG Talk Show, we're going to

0:02

talk about Professor Dungeon Master's video about cheap miniatures. We

0:04

have two Kickstarters to look at today. Monsters of Drakenheim,

0:06

the Kickstarter by Ghostfire Gaming, in partnership with the Dungeon

0:08

Dudes. The Cairn second edition boxed set. We're going to

0:10

look at the new White that has come out for

0:12

Tales of the Valiant for the Monster Vault. I'm going

0:15

to show off the new search engine for Sly Flourish

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because I worked on it really hard and I'm going

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to show it off. Today's big topic is going to

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be the two different games we play at the same

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table in our fantasy role-playing games and what that means

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about our games and what we can do and how

0:28

we can prepare. For more questions from

0:30

the March 2024 Patreon Q&A, all today on

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the Lazy RPG Talk Show, I'm Mike Shea,

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your pal from Sly Flourish, here to talk

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please consider joining the Patreon. You can find a link to

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it in the show notes and to the

1:01

patrons of Sly Flourish. Thank you so much

1:03

for your outstanding support. So Professor Dungeon Master

1:05

did a really good video on where to

1:07

find miniatures. I just wanted to give a

1:09

quick highlight on this because it's a really

1:12

great video that tells you lots of different

1:14

ways to find cheap miniatures for your game.

1:16

So if you are looking to get cheap

1:18

miniatures for your game, he has lots of

1:21

suggestions about where you can get them, where

1:23

you can get painted miniatures, unpainted miniatures, all

1:26

different kinds of places. This one I thought was really

1:28

funny, was like you can go buy the Heroes

1:30

of the Warriors of Kryn box sets.

1:32

I've seen this before a couple of

1:34

times. You can get the tile campaign

1:36

case and you can get

1:38

the token campaign case for D&D for

1:41

like three bucks at Ollie's. I don't even know

1:43

what Ollie's is. Some other people know what

1:45

Ollie's is, but on occasion

1:47

they've been getting lots of

1:49

the Heroes of Kryn board

1:52

game, the terrain campaign case

1:54

and the miniatures, the little

1:56

token campaign case. I

1:58

would not recommend buying them at full price. I've had

2:00

them, I actually gave them away because I have so

2:02

many miniatures, I didn't need them. And they're not bad.

2:04

And if you don't have anything, they're pretty cool. For

2:06

$3, they're totally worth it. And I'd say for 20,

2:08

they're probably worth it at $20. I

2:11

don't think I'd pay more than $20 for like the

2:13

campaign case miniatures, but those are a great way

2:15

to get that. But there's lots of other places.

2:17

This is, I gotta poke because I think it's

2:19

really funny. No matter how big

2:21

your company is, you're always one

2:23

aisle away from bankruptcies. Lots of

2:25

different options and lots of different

2:27

ways that you can get miniatures

2:30

for your games. Miniatures are one of these

2:32

tough things where like, there's no just easy,

2:34

straightforward way to get miniatures. That getting miniatures

2:36

is a long process. You have to get

2:38

like bargain bin places. Getting them on eBay

2:41

is not always such a terrible place. You

2:44

know, getting 3D printed miniatures, stuff like that. This

2:46

is one area where playing online has a huge

2:48

advantage over playing in person. Because

2:50

the miniature collection hobby, which

2:53

is its own hobby, I

2:55

think is a sucker's game. And it's because you'll

2:58

never have the miniatures that you always need. You'll

3:00

always be one ghoul shy of all the ghouls that

3:02

you need. I've been collecting miniatures for

3:04

20 years and I've got thousands of miniatures. And I

3:06

still run into the problem of either not being able

3:08

to find the one that I need, or

3:10

I never have enough of the one that I need and I have

3:12

to substitute a different kind of miniature for it. And

3:15

you could just, you could, you know, there's no upper

3:17

limit to the amount of money you could spend

3:20

on miniatures. And I just don't think it's a,

3:22

I think there are other ways. I have my

3:24

lazy monster tokens, which I recommend. There are other

3:26

things that you can do. You can actually make

3:28

cooler monster tokens. The idea of getting a one

3:30

inch adhesive magnet and an epoxy sticker and

3:32

then printing out a token and getting a

3:34

one inch hole punch and punching it out

3:36

and putting it on your magnet and then

3:38

putting your epoxy sticker on the top, you

3:40

can make really cool custom tokens for

3:43

very, very little. And you can make a

3:45

bunch of generic tokens to kind of fill in the blank

3:47

and then use one custom token. It's a great approach. Anyway,

3:49

I have a link to that in my video. But also

3:51

I think that Dungeon Crafts video, PDMs video

3:53

about getting miniatures on the cheap is a really good

3:55

video to watch. So check that out. Our

3:58

friends over at Ghostfire Gaming and. The

4:00

dungeon dudes are going together once again to

4:02

make a book called the monsters of Drakenheim

4:04

It is already crossed four thousand four hundred

4:06

people that backed its PDF and print version

4:09

This is also the first time so it

4:11

is a bunch of a 300 pages of

4:13

terror You know

4:15

hundred and fifty terrifying monsters ten

4:17

easy to run layers So it's including some layers

4:19

in the book and if you have dungeons of

4:21

Drakenheim You know the quality of the material that's

4:23

coming out here and ghostfire gaming's makes fantastic books

4:26

So this is definitely gonna be cool You know I have

4:28

friends that are working on this book. It looks really really

4:30

great This is also interestingly the first

4:32

time that D&D Beyond is one of the options

4:34

that they somehow worked out some kind of deal

4:36

With D&D Beyond so that you can I think

4:38

it is only I don't think it's one of

4:40

the pledges I think you

4:42

can only get it as an add-on But as an add-on

4:44

you can get D&D Beyond access to it This is the

4:47

first time that we've heard of where a company

4:49

is With a product that isn't even

4:51

done yet has a relationship where they're gonna be able to

4:53

get these products in D&D Beyond So

4:55

there's that I of course recommend instead of getting

4:57

the D&D Beyond version that you should get the

4:59

PDF version because you can download it and you can save it

5:01

and You can put on USB disk and you can save deposit

5:04

box And you know that you always have it and you never

5:06

have to worry about them changing their mind or some kind of

5:08

license agreement Going on I know

5:10

I am I am sure that the license agreement

5:12

that you sign with D&D Beyond Give them permission

5:14

to remove their access remove your access to this

5:16

book if you've got it I am almost sure

5:18

that that isn't there ever read it But I'm

5:20

pretty sure they are not going to guarantee that

5:23

you will always have access forever Because

5:25

they can't and because they won't so lots of

5:27

cool options lots of different ways to get it

5:30

I picked up the PDF version of this because I

5:32

don't know that I need a physical another physical monster

5:34

book I have so many physical monster books but

5:36

it's really really neat and the quality of the

5:38

material that comes out of ghostfire gaming's and and

5:41

Dungeons of Drakenheim is a fantastic book on

5:43

itself So this is definitely a Kickstarter that

5:45

I recommend taking a look at you can

5:47

find a link to the monsters of Drakenheim

5:50

Kickstarter in the show notes Another

5:53

interesting Kickstarter is for Karen the

5:55

Karen Tui box set so Karen

5:57

is a very lightweight

6:00

20 page RPG you can get the

6:02

rules for free off DriveThru RPG you

6:04

can also get them off D&B on

6:07

and this is another one where like there

6:09

is no reason for you to not go

6:11

check out the free rules because they're totally

6:13

free and I picked it

6:15

up I read through it yesterday I actually

6:17

bought a couple of physical copies Bob World

6:19

Builder recommended on his channel and I so

6:22

I bought a couple of physical copies because

6:24

they were like they were super cheap how

6:26

much of has it for by a physical copy $3

6:28

you can buy $3 I think I bought like

6:30

four of them shipping is gonna cost way more than

6:33

the book so you can get a $3 version of

6:35

this thing five by eight book it's about 20 pages

6:37

long glue stitch it's unfortunately not saddle stitch it'd be

6:39

cool for the saddle stitch but whatever we go who's

6:41

gonna complain for three bucks and

6:44

it's a very lightweight RPG it is a

6:46

roll under system so you have your attributes

6:48

your your checks are to roll under very

6:50

lightweight hit points are sort of you know

6:52

everything is very abstracted hit points are

6:55

you you would you remove

6:58

they have sort of damage thresholds you automatically

7:00

have damage when you roll your damage die but

7:03

you have damage thresholds you have to cross so it is you

7:05

don't roll attack rolls that seems to be kind of a new

7:07

thing too anyway you

7:09

could take a look at what the rules are for Karen one because it'll give

7:11

you a good idea what the rules are going to look like for Karen to

7:14

now this one it was like wow it's

7:16

really one thing that's interesting is they have

7:18

this exclusive heavy-duty box set that includes two

7:20

books a GM screen a bunch of character

7:22

sheet pads three core books that are

7:24

included including an adventure book all in one big

7:26

box set and it's 50 bucks

7:29

which is really cheap for

7:31

a small print run box

7:33

set like this so I was like you know what

7:36

I'm for like normally I would just say I go

7:38

check out the PDF and get what you want but

7:40

$50 is a really good price for a box set

7:42

that includes all this kind of thing so it looks

7:44

like a really good value but if you're not sure

7:46

if you want sort of another kind of old-school lightweight

7:48

RPG because there's a lot of them these days definitely

7:50

check out at least the free rules to see if

7:52

the rules are the kind of thing that you'd be

7:54

interested in and then you can decide like is it

7:56

would it be kind of fun to get a box

7:59

set I collect everything So I'm like, yeah, I definitely want

8:01

to go pick up a box. But

8:03

yeah, $50 for a box like this is a really,

8:06

really good deal. So check that out. They have 2300

8:08

backers so far with 25 days left to go. And

8:10

that's the Karen second edition Kickstarter. My recommendation is download

8:12

the free rules, check them out. And if you like

8:14

it, then you can decide if you want to back

8:16

it. Tales of the Valiant has on occasion been posting

8:18

previews of the monsters that we're going to see in

8:20

the upcoming Tales of the Valiant Monster Vault, which I

8:23

think is coming out in May. So

8:25

not too far off, right? A couple months. And

8:28

they have the white. The white is a

8:30

really interesting creature for me. I

8:33

already belong to email. The white

8:35

is a really interesting creature for me

8:37

because it's one where I have felt

8:39

let down by the 2014 monster

8:42

manual version of the white for a

8:44

long time that as a, as a

8:46

CR3 monster, I felt like it should

8:48

be doing significantly more damage and be

8:50

a significantly greater threat than what the

8:52

2014 monster manual white

8:54

was able to do. And the reason why

8:56

is they were over weighting the life drain

8:58

that life drain counts, I think

9:01

in, we figured out in their math that

9:03

if a life drain counts as double the

9:05

amount of damage that it would do. So

9:07

if you were going to, if, if you have a

9:09

life drain for 10 points, it's the equivalent of 20

9:11

points of damage, and that just doesn't play out just

9:13

because it has a life drain doesn't mean that the

9:15

threat should be half as much as it normally is.

9:18

So we're starting to see whites that have a new

9:20

one, though white to me, and I'm going to talk

9:22

a little bit more about this, the white to me

9:24

is also a really important creature because of the challenge

9:26

rating that it has. It sits at

9:28

what I think to be the perfect

9:31

challenge rating for a monster. I think

9:33

CR3 is one of the best

9:35

challenge ratings of monsters and I will explain why,

9:37

but because I, that I have such a heavy

9:39

weight on CR3 in particular, the white is a

9:42

monster that fits in there. So taking a look

9:44

at it, and now we have multiple versions of

9:46

whites. We have the level up advanced 5D white,

9:48

we have the 2014 D&D

9:51

monster manual white, and we have the

9:53

tales of the valiant white. So we

9:55

now have three different just vanilla fifth

9:58

edition white characters. So

10:00

the the COBOL press one definitely hits

10:02

hard, but it's got some interesting little

10:04

dials built into it that I want

10:06

to talk about. So it's AC 14.

10:09

Some would say that's low. That's actually the same. I think that's

10:11

the same AC as the 2014 one. So

10:13

we'll pull up this white from the artisanal

10:15

monster database. So we have all three

10:17

whites here. We have the COBOL press

10:20

white. We have the fifth edition 2014

10:22

monster manual white. And we have the white

10:25

from level up advanced 5e by way of

10:27

the artisanal monster database. The artisanal monster database

10:29

is a fly flourish patreon feature where you

10:31

can get monsters from a whole bunch of

10:34

different monster books, including level up advanced 5e,

10:36

tobe's one, tobe's two, tobe's three and creature

10:38

codex monsters all available in one database that

10:40

you can that you can download. You can

10:43

actually download the database. You can get the

10:45

monsters in markdown format and you can drop

10:47

them right into your game notes. And they're

10:49

all available under the open gaming license or

10:52

the creative commons license. So very cool. And we

10:54

have page numbers for all of them so you can

10:56

go look them up in the actual book with links

10:58

to the actual book because you should get the actual

11:00

books. The books are fantastic. So we have all these

11:02

three versions of the white level up advanced 5e, 2014

11:04

monster manual and tales of the valiant. So one thing

11:06

you'll see is that the it has

11:08

significantly more hit points that the original 2014

11:10

monster manual has 45 hit points. So

11:14

so does the one from level up advanced 5e. But

11:17

the white from toma

11:19

beasts has 70 hit

11:22

points, which is not quite double, but getting getting

11:24

pretty close to double. We can also add what

11:26

the forge a foes monster stats would

11:28

be for this. The forge a foes monster stats come

11:30

out of the book forge a foes. Of course, I

11:32

have another tool called the forge a foes monster stat

11:34

generator where you can generate stats for any monster from

11:36

level from forge a foes. Then it's also available to

11:39

patrons of life flourish again. Lots of cool tools that

11:41

you get for being a patron of life flourish. I

11:43

would definitely recommend becoming a patron of life because you

11:45

get a really good deal. So we'll take a look

11:47

at that as well. So you can see that the

11:49

forge a foes benchmark says AC 13 slightly

11:51

less than armor class, but 65 hit points closer

11:53

to what the monster vault version has. AC is

11:56

about the same. AC is relatively low. Now, of

11:58

course, you can always add AC. they're wearing

12:00

plates and now they have an AC of

12:02

18. You can always beat them up by

12:04

describing other armor they have. Other stats look

12:07

all pretty straightforward, pretty standard. I'm definitely

12:09

digging the idea of not bothering with proficiencies for

12:11

saving throws and stuff like that and just putting

12:14

it straight into the core stat. So you just

12:16

have the core stat bonuses. You don't need their

12:18

scores. You don't need to have saving throws being

12:20

separated out. You just have it wired in there.

12:22

I really like that idea. So this

12:24

is martial adept, manufactured weapons, so this is ordered bows

12:27

deals an extra weapon of damage. That way they can

12:29

beef up the damage. I like that. Other ones have

12:31

sunlight sensitivity. That's important to note. So

12:33

then we get to the actions and the white

12:35

makes two longsword or longbow attacks. It can replace

12:37

one attack with life drain. The life drain is

12:40

10 necrotic damage, which is pretty hefty. DC 13

12:42

or its maximum maximum hit points is reduced by

12:44

amount equal to the damage. So the life drain

12:46

is still significant. Also notice plus five to hit.

12:48

I think that the this one is plus

12:50

four to hit. The life drain of the 2014 is plus

12:53

four to hit. The one from

12:55

the menagerie is plus four to hit. So it

12:57

has a little bit more accuracy when

12:59

it's hitting. It can

13:01

also do longsword attacks. The longsword

13:03

attack do 12 damage each. So

13:05

it does 24 damage at CR

13:07

3, which I think is right

13:09

on the amount of damage. That's

13:12

the exact same amount of damage

13:14

that a forgefo's benchmark monster does.

13:16

So this one is actually hitting

13:18

on pretty closely to the forgefo's

13:20

monster stat block. The monster statistics

13:22

by challenge rating stat block line.

13:24

So that by definition means that I like

13:26

it. And then as a longsword

13:29

attack. Now it also has this bonus action where

13:31

it can command up to five friendly skeletons or

13:33

zombies to do one of the following. Protect, overwhelm

13:35

or shamble. Protect means that each friendly creature within

13:37

five feet is attacked. The target can use this

13:39

reaction, intercept the attack, becoming the target instead. So

13:41

you can put skeletons on it and have to

13:44

beat the skeletons. Overwhelm the target

13:46

creatures have advantage on attack rolls so it

13:48

could give a bunch of skeletons attack advantage.

13:50

That's a lot. This is actually overwhelmed could

13:52

be really dangerous. And then shambling is they

13:55

get to move around and attacks against them

13:57

using an opportunity to attack or disadvantage. I like that it's

13:59

not quite that they're moving so fast that you don't get in

14:01

a way, you still get in a way, you're just disadvantaged in

14:03

the attack. That's pretty cool. Until the

14:05

start of the next one, each target has advantage on attack growth

14:07

against a creature on its turn if at

14:09

least one other target is with... Okay, so they overwhelm,

14:12

they all have to be kind of grouped together, but

14:14

it works really well. So one of

14:16

the reasons... Let me just be frank, I think

14:18

this stat block is outstanding. I really, really like

14:20

it. I think it hits really

14:22

hard, it definitely works well, and

14:24

it's got lots of cool crunch, but there's a

14:27

particular reason why I like the white at CR3.

14:29

And it's because

14:31

a CR3 monster, regardless of

14:33

whether it's a white or anything else, a veteran

14:35

is another example of a

14:37

CR3 monster that I use all the time.

14:40

And that's because it fits this perfect range

14:42

of challenge rating where it can be useful

14:44

from second level to like 15th

14:46

level as a monster against the characters. And

14:48

let me explain. At second level,

14:51

a CR3 white makes a really good boss

14:53

monster, right? It's gonna be hard at second

14:55

level. It's gonna be a really threatening boss.

14:57

It'll probably wipe out first level, so you

14:59

never want to use it against first level characters. Second

15:02

level characters, it makes a good solo boss monster.

15:04

I would not be throwing a bunch of skeletons

15:06

on top of it, but you could. It

15:08

makes a good elite style monster. Essentially,

15:10

you have one white for

15:13

every two characters. By the time the characters

15:15

are hitting about fourth level, right?

15:17

You can... fourth or fifth level, you can throw

15:19

two whites at them, and they'll be pretty dangerous.

15:22

A white, a CR3 creature, is roughly

15:24

equivalent to a sixth or seventh level

15:27

character, which means if you have like

15:29

seventh level characters, you can throw one white

15:31

per character, and that's a really good fight. So now

15:33

we've already gone from second level to seventh level using

15:35

the same stat block in a different way. Then,

15:38

as the further along they go, when they start to get 10, 12,

15:40

14, they get into that CR12, 13 range, these guys can start acting

15:45

as minions that you can actually throw a whole

15:47

bunch of whites at them, and they can use

15:49

turn undead to kind of blow them apart, and

15:51

they can send a bunch of away. A couple

15:53

of fireballs will blow them away. So they make

15:55

for really strong minions pretty much all the way

15:57

up until the end of the game. going

16:00

to be particularly threatening at level

16:02

17 and above, but up

16:04

through level 16, you can

16:07

throw whites, these CR3 whites at players,

16:09

at player characters, and they will be

16:11

a decent threat. So that means you

16:13

have one stat block, one

16:16

CR3 stat block that remains

16:19

useful from second level to

16:21

like 15th level or

16:23

16th level. That's where you

16:25

get the versatility. And that's where we get into the

16:28

bounded accuracy of 5E and why that matters. A lot

16:30

of people lament challenge rating. They

16:32

talk about challenge rating and say challenge rating,

16:34

and I have complained about challenge rating for

16:36

a long time. CR3 doesn't actually mean anything.

16:39

All CR3 tells you is that it's harder

16:41

than a CR2 and it's not as hard

16:43

as a CR4. It really doesn't have any

16:45

other meaning built into it. You have to

16:47

do a bunch of calculations in order to

16:49

determine what kind of threat a CR3 has

16:52

against characters of different levels. I've done that with

16:54

the lazy encounter benchmark and lots of other things,

16:56

but you have to do some kind of

16:58

math. An easy argument is, well,

17:00

monsters should just have levels instead. If you

17:02

look at Baldur's Gate 3, monsters have levels,

17:04

and a level 3 monster would be equivalent

17:06

to a level 3 character. That makes perfect

17:08

sense. The problem is when you assign levels

17:10

to monsters, like let's say you made the white, and instead

17:12

of saying it's a CR3, you say it's a level 6.

17:16

The problem is that that means generally, DMs

17:18

are only going to run those against characters

17:20

that are level 4 to level 8. They'd

17:22

be hard for level 4, they'd be easier for level 8,

17:24

but they're not going to bother with level 6s at higher

17:26

levels because they're like, oh, they're level 6, and the characters

17:28

are level 13, they don't match up. So

17:31

that's why having challenge rating be disassociated from

17:33

level and basically saying that the way you

17:35

determine the threat of a monster is completely

17:37

different than the way you determine the threat

17:39

of a character means that monsters can be

17:41

a threat to characters at a much wider

17:44

range than they normally can. So

17:46

that's why I think that's one

17:48

advantage that CR has, that idea that

17:50

we have these bounds of what the

17:52

challenge rating of a monster is means

17:54

that those monsters can be relevant throughout

17:57

a much longer range of time. the

18:00

Google's game the characters are 13th level and I'm still

18:02

regularly throwing CR1 monsters

18:04

at them because CR1 monsters in

18:06

hordes can still be an interesting

18:08

flavorful thing. If they manage to

18:11

get a few hits off they might actually do a

18:13

little bit of damage and they make the players feel

18:15

awesome by having their characters just mow down piles of

18:17

monsters at once. So that's why I

18:19

think CR3 is so important. I really like the CR3

18:21

white. One neat thing about

18:23

the CR3 white for Tales of the

18:25

Valiant is that you can turn

18:28

on and off these abilities. There are dials in

18:30

here that make the difficulty different and the example

18:32

is if you want it to

18:34

hit harder you can have an attack as

18:36

a two hand weapon attack doing 28 damage

18:39

up to 28

18:41

damage per attack or per

18:43

round. So that is a

18:45

lot of damage. You can also decide whether or

18:47

not you want to use these bonus actions or

18:49

not. Maybe if they don't have any skeletons or

18:51

zombies around they're not even going to bother using

18:53

the bonus action. So that can work well or

18:55

if you want to make these guys really powerful

18:57

you could have like four

18:59

whites with 20 skeletons and each of

19:01

the whites are able to command those

19:03

skeletons and have them all attack with

19:05

advantage. So there's dials in the difficulty

19:07

of this one stat block that let

19:09

you decide how dangerous you want the

19:11

monster to be. One thing that I

19:14

would recommend is you don't always just turn

19:16

the dial all the way to the right

19:18

and make it as dangerous as possible. Instead

19:20

it's okay to run them sub-optimally. It's okay

19:22

for them to not attack with two

19:25

hands on their weapon and instead just do 12 instead of

19:27

14 damage. You get to decide

19:29

how tough they are being. You get to decide

19:31

what circumstances to include them all in and

19:33

how you want to turn those dials. And I

19:36

think all of that is kind of built into this

19:38

one stat block. It's really cool and I like it.

19:40

So I'm very much, this is again making me really

19:42

excited to see the Cobalt Press Tales

19:44

of the Valiant Monster Vault. I think it looks

19:47

like it's going to be an outstanding monster book.

19:49

The big question to me and it's going to

19:51

break my heart is, is it going to eclipse

19:53

the level up Advanced 5e Monsters Menagerie as my

19:56

favorite book of monsters? I won't know till I

19:58

have it in hand. seen them

20:00

side by side. But so far, I really

20:02

like the design ethos that has gone into

20:04

Tales of the Valiant Monsters. And

20:06

in a couple months, we're going to be taking a good look at it. So it's gonna

20:09

be pretty neat. I want to show off a new

20:11

search engine I have for Sly Flair. So if you've never really spent

20:13

a lot of time on Sly Flair, you should. There's

20:15

a lot of really cool articles, but I recognize

20:17

that a lot of times people subscribe to the

20:19

newsletter. I think we are now at the point

20:21

where on the average, five times more people are

20:24

reading the Sly Flair's newsletter than are hitting the

20:26

articles on the website. But the website, I have

20:28

stuff that goes back there for like 15 years.

20:30

And I created a new search engine. So before

20:32

I was going to doc.go to do a search

20:35

engine. But now I have a new search engine

20:37

that I just put in place using fancy space

20:39

age JavaScript technology, a in

20:41

browser search engine that is called

20:43

lunar.js is behind the scenes here.

20:45

And you can type anything you

20:47

like, Vorpal, and you get all

20:49

the articles that have Vorpal swords in it, you can

20:52

type theater the mind, and you get all of the

20:54

articles that have theater the mind, like I didn't spell

20:56

it right and still managed to find them. Monster Optimization,

20:58

Ghouls and Deathlock Whites, these are all from the fourth

21:00

edition, fourth edition area, really, really

21:02

fast, pretty straightforward. So

21:05

what I recommend is any of the topics that you hear me

21:07

talking about anytime you want to learn more about what I've been

21:09

talking about the eight steps, check out the

21:12

search engine and you can you can type it in and you can

21:14

get all of the articles that I've written on any

21:16

given topic with the search engine. I

21:18

want to think so this is one of those things

21:20

where because patrons of Sly Flair have been so generous

21:23

in subscribing, it has allowed me time to go dive

21:25

into things like this and spend, you know, a few

21:27

hours I think if I have four or five hours

21:29

it took me to wire in a new search engine

21:31

for this I actually am using the same search engine

21:33

for this that I'm using for the Sly Flair's Patreon

21:36

Q&A database and I was like, you know, that database

21:38

works so well over there the search engine for that

21:40

works so well over there. What if I

21:42

wired that directly into Sly Flair's and so I

21:44

spent some time with it and now we have

21:46

a new search engine for Sly Flair's right on

21:48

the website. So any topic that you want to

21:50

learn about tokens, you can

21:52

type in a search and you can get an

21:55

article that talks about the tokens. Here's an example

21:57

article where I was talking about how to make

21:59

cheap tokens. for about 30 bucks that can last

22:01

you for your whole game, just

22:03

by typing in search. So try out the

22:05

search, go to slyflourish.com, try out the search,

22:07

search for articles, look for things and

22:10

give it a shot. So I wanted to put

22:12

a little spotlight on that. So today we're gonna

22:14

talk about the two different games we play at

22:16

the table. What does that even mean? What

22:19

am I talking about? This is one

22:21

of those things that is both really

22:23

obvious, but also really interesting

22:25

when we look at it in this particular

22:27

way. When we sit down, when

22:30

we GM sit down at the table and we're

22:32

running our fantasy RPG and our players are sitting

22:34

down at the table and they are playing in

22:36

our fantasy RPG, we like

22:38

to think we're playing the same game, but

22:40

we're really not playing the same game. We're

22:43

really playing two different games that happen to

22:45

be meshing together. We're playing two

22:47

different sides, two totally different ways with totally different sets

22:49

of rules that are in front of us. And

22:52

we're talking about the points where these two

22:54

sets of rules connect to one another, that

22:56

if I do damage, you know to subtract

22:58

it from hit points. If I asked for

23:00

a saving throw, you know what ability score

23:02

to roll it on. If I give you

23:04

a DC, you know what skill to roll

23:06

against. We have these sort of interface points

23:08

that cross the table from what the

23:10

GM is describing to what the player is

23:12

describing. But we're really got two separate things.

23:14

And that example is when we look at

23:16

the stat block for the white, it

23:19

doesn't look anything like a character looks

23:21

like. That monsters, the design of

23:23

monsters, this has been true since

23:25

fourth edition. Third edition, you actually had

23:27

monsters that were built along the lines

23:29

of the same rules that characters were built with. And that

23:32

was kind of a mess. It meant that building and customizing

23:34

monsters was a real chore. But since

23:36

fourth edition, monster design and character

23:38

design have been very different. And that was

23:40

true all the way back. That was actually

23:42

only third edition was the version where monster

23:45

design and character design were designed together. Monsters

23:47

had always been designed differently than characters when

23:49

you look at second and first and early

23:51

editions of D&D. So the

23:53

idea that you have these two different things, you have

23:55

monsters on one side, you have characters on the other

23:57

side. And yet they're built.

24:00

completely differently kind of

24:02

highlights the point that we're kind of playing

24:04

two different games at the table. We have

24:06

two different sets of rules. We have two

24:08

different ways that we look at it. So,

24:10

well, who cares? Okay, so let's say that's

24:13

true, right? And I think it is true.

24:15

But let's, who cares? What does that matter?

24:17

Why it matters is, that means that either

24:19

side of the equation can change out parts

24:21

of their game engine and not

24:24

affect the other side. And an

24:26

example is, I had people who asked me,

24:28

hey, are you gonna be running level up

24:30

advanced 5e? You talk about running level up

24:32

advanced 5e all the time. Are you actually

24:34

gonna run it? Now what they mean is,

24:36

am I gonna make the players use it? Because

24:38

I've been running level up advanced 5e for more

24:41

than a year now. It's been over a year

24:43

since I've run a 2014 Monster Manual monster. And

24:45

almost always I

24:48

grabbed the level up advanced 5e monster menagerie and use

24:50

that. I've been using that for now a long time

24:52

and I love it because in

24:55

my experience, in my opinion, in

24:57

my experience, it is better in

24:59

every way than the 2014 Monster Manual. The

25:02

monster's menagerie is better in

25:04

every way. The monsters are

25:06

designed better. The layout is

25:08

fine. The addition of treasure

25:10

parcels and random encounters and not monster

25:12

lore has made that book far more

25:14

valuable to me than the Monster Manual.

25:16

Now we could argue about things like

25:18

art. I think the art in the

25:21

original Monster Manual, in many cases, I

25:23

like it better. The layout is also

25:25

a little bit tight in level up

25:27

advanced 5e's monster menagerie. But generally speaking,

25:29

it is a really, really fantastic book.

25:31

And I like it in every way.

25:33

Which meant that I could rip out

25:36

the dungeon master's guide and rip out the

25:38

Monster Manual and replace them with level up

25:41

advanced 5e's trials and treasure and

25:43

the monster's menagerie. And now

25:45

my part of the game is running completely differently.

25:48

And the players are still playing. Now the monsters

25:50

they're facing are slightly different and they're seeing new

25:52

abilities. Again, the level up advanced 5e white is

25:54

different than the 2014 white. In

25:56

many cases, the monsters are hitting harder. But

25:59

The Reality... He did it that that

26:01

and they're still playing the same game. They have their

26:03

players handbook on their side or use that twenty four

26:05

team players handbook on their side. but I'm running a

26:07

completely. Different side of the game. and so when

26:09

we think about the fact that the g. M

26:11

side of the game and the players. As a

26:13

gamer really two different games are two different engines

26:16

and we can swap out. We could rip out

26:18

and put in new parts of those engines. We'd

26:20

really get him an interesting look at how modular

26:22

this this game is. So that idea when people

26:24

ask me I get my plane level possessed by

26:26

V by users yeah I'm playing now on the

26:29

Gm site. It's one hundred percent level possessed by

26:31

not a hundred percent because I'm putting other monster

26:33

but still I used to will be one a

26:35

lot. Now again, this isn't like completely Wilde because

26:37

an example of have you ever run a third

26:39

party adventure or if you run an. Adventure that

26:42

wasn't published by Wizards. Technically, you're swapping out

26:44

parts of the engine because you're finding a

26:46

pub, a set of rules, a set of

26:48

of of the scenario that came from another

26:50

publisher, and you bring that it's now course

26:52

homebrew, People. Homebrew all the time.

26:54

So you're flipping out parts a year game

26:56

for homebrew, party or game all the time.

26:58

and it changes the game. And it changes

27:00

the adventures entities as a story. And

27:02

you're able to do that because this game is so

27:04

flexible. You can rip out those parts of the

27:07

engine. I think it's really really fascinating When we

27:09

think about how the design of this game

27:11

is that lets us rip out these pieces,

27:13

you can say oh I What? I don't really

27:15

like how I've been running travel so I'm going

27:17

to kind of pull out the very thin

27:19

travel system that is in there and slide

27:21

in uncovered journeys by Cubicle Seven and now you

27:24

have this whole new big sick book that

27:26

talks about all the different kinds of journeys

27:28

and all the kinds of encounters in all kinds

27:30

of systems in other kinds of character role

27:32

that ten exists for characters while they're going

27:34

on. the. Sunnis from a book that was

27:36

never even considered when the Twenty Fourteen

27:38

books were published. I think that's. I

27:41

think that's fascinating. For one

27:43

way I like to think about this is

27:45

from like the nerd programming perspective of an

27:47

A P I that instead of and in

27:49

the world of computer programming as a single

27:51

application programming interfaces which is like when I

27:53

want to reach out to a website and

27:55

pull down data from that website, I don't

27:57

need to know the underlying structure of how

27:59

that website. I can just make

28:01

certain calls and they will respond with

28:03

certain amounts of values coming back. And

28:05

it allows two different applications that don't

28:07

understand their underlying technology and are built

28:09

on totally different technology to be able

28:11

to talk to one another. That's really

28:13

how this edition works. That Sits Edition

28:15

has this sort of abstracted interface: Ability

28:17

checks, combat abilities, hit points, armor class,

28:19

lots of other things. Were those things

28:21

all match up and there are certain

28:23

perspectives. We expect D C to be

28:25

within a certain range. We expect damage

28:28

values to be a certain range. hopefully.

28:30

A Cr Three Esc improvement to another C or

28:32

three as opposed to another see a three other.

28:34

We know that that's not really true, but you

28:36

saw me comparing multiple C or three earlier and

28:38

you can see like okay, here's variance in the

28:40

sea or three, but we can account for that.

28:43

variants. See, you have these sort of interfaces that

28:45

connect together and these different interfaces that connect together

28:47

mean that we can rip out and change and

28:49

switch out and custom build and swap out and

28:51

do all kinds of stuff on both sides, and

28:54

still the game messes together at the same level.

28:56

So it's interesting is when people been talking about

28:58

the Twenty Twenty Four boxes been a lot of

29:00

people saying i don't think it's really going to

29:02

be compatible or it's really the indie five Point

29:05

Five or it's really a sixth edition. We should

29:07

pretend it's something else and there's a lotta hemming

29:09

and hawing, but I don't think it's actually going

29:11

to be that hard for the Twenty Twenty Four

29:13

bucks the plug into everything else that were using.

29:15

I think that she could have a Twenty Twenty

29:18

Four Players Handbook and have characters Bill from the

29:20

Player's Handbook that connects to Level Up, a Death

29:22

by The Or Tails of the Valiant or the

29:24

Twenty Fourteen both or whatever and A probably going

29:26

to mess well enough in the same way that

29:29

not every see our three. The clifford every C

29:31

or three every level seven character isn't could

29:33

be the same as every other level seven

29:35

character. Sometimes it may be more powerful a

29:37

Suffolk that I have a feeling that twenty

29:39

twenty four characters are going to be basically

29:41

one level higher. In. Power than we think

29:43

they are. So a level two twenty three four

29:45

character is going to feel more like a level

29:47

three twenty Fourteen character, but maybe not the dried

29:49

up. Get a fourth and fifth level? Probably not.

29:52

But because they get an extra seats because things

29:54

have been streamlined a bit, I have a feeling

29:56

they're gonna be slightly more powerful. The going to

29:58

feel more powerful. Same is true. The Tail to

30:00

the Valiant where I think they've said characters that

30:02

are built entails a valid are going to be

30:05

Meteor and and Tougher than your vanilla. Twenty fourteen

30:07

characters could be, but we seen a lot of

30:09

various just and Twenty fourteen characters like whether or

30:11

not they have power attacker know whether or not

30:13

the a certain spells, whether or not they've multi

30:16

class, whether that they have certain seats we see

30:18

a lot a range within the love of the

30:20

characters anyway. so I actually don't think we're going

30:22

to see. An think it's could be

30:24

that difficult to see the Twenty Twenty Four D

30:26

and Deepwater messing with all of the other Fi

30:28

the stuff we have because we're seeing all the

30:31

other five the books messing and together we're seeing

30:33

tales of or else we're seeing Passes, Cauldron of

30:35

Everything and Zenith our guides. We're seeing other of

30:37

books likable presses. Tom of Heroes and Mid Guard

30:39

Heroes were seeing all of these different books are

30:41

both sides that are able to mess together and

30:43

we are able to run at the table Now

30:46

obviously there's lots of areas where we can bring

30:48

in books and ideas and concepts from other games

30:50

that don't have a direct mechanical effects of in

30:52

those we don't even need. To worry about the

30:54

A P Ice if you like to travel system you

30:56

find in an O S R game and you when

30:58

to bring that i was our travel like system into

31:00

your five he gave me to just do it. If

31:03

you want to grab the escalation die from thirteen days

31:05

because you think that's cool he could just do it.

31:07

There's lots of times a week and find pieces from

31:09

other games and flopped him in our games and the

31:11

neat thing is on the g side we can try

31:14

stuff out for one little bits we don't have to

31:16

decide. Oh hey, I'm going to rip out every monster

31:18

that ever used and replace them with other monsters like

31:20

the others. A lot of times people talk about we

31:22

mortals I think. And Cdm referred

31:24

to Flee Mortals as a replacement of the Monster Manual.

31:27

You can, but you don't have to. Instead you could

31:29

just say I only one around the vampire for months.

31:31

And Cdm A. Being selfish, I wrote the Vampire from

31:33

Cydia, but like you to decide you just one on

31:35

one months or see what it's like I've done. That's

31:37

where. I haven't run every monster from free mortals, but

31:40

I've run the hobgoblin because of ghosts. Let me try

31:42

those hop dollars. they sound really cool and interesting. Let

31:44

me drop those it and see what they do. And

31:46

they did something to try to mimic. Ah, so that's

31:48

what these. That's how these guys are different than the

31:50

typical monsters that I face. so you can try things

31:53

on the G inside. Syria. Comically. Hey I just

31:55

want to try this. One thing for this one that I

31:57

just had a friend is one thing for the sunset. Adjust

31:59

the you. Do you really really small changes

32:01

and have them be one off changes that only

32:03

happened at one time and then if you decide

32:05

you like I'm maybe wire them in more but

32:07

maybe say like I'm gonna have a magic item

32:09

I think I did this were of like I

32:11

want to try the tail the Valiant Lox system

32:13

but I wasn't sure I wanted to be forever

32:15

so I said let me put this in here

32:17

and see how it works and try it just

32:19

for like assassin and another All this work really

32:21

well. Let me go for another Sessler Geneticists and

32:23

suddenly now he has replaced Inspiration and all of

32:25

my games because the Lox system from Tulsa the

32:27

Valiant for me as a Dm is a superior

32:29

system. Because I don't have to think about it, they

32:32

get on the they get lox. They get the advantage

32:34

of having something good happen when they fail. A role

32:36

was I think is really outstanding from I'm From a

32:38

Beat and as An Hour From a Beating the pacing

32:40

Sam points and they managed it themselves. which means I

32:42

don't have managed to the at all. So I love

32:44

the Tales of the Valiant lox systems and that as

32:46

an example of like where I can take a component

32:49

out of five, a rip it out and replace it

32:51

with another once and everything works perfectly. So this idea

32:53

that we have this sort of after a game that

32:55

were playing two different games that the table that these

32:57

games have the sort of gen our is this abstract

32:59

interface that. Exists between these different sides in that

33:01

we can sort of slide things into the

33:03

interface. we could connect things into the interface.

33:05

It makes our game so flexible. It means

33:07

that we can seize thing so much and

33:10

it's one of the things I just absolutely

33:12

adore about this edition. This edition has been

33:14

so popular over the past ten years that

33:16

and there are so many different sources of

33:18

information that are compatible. A fifth edition and

33:20

we can try out with. If it isn't

33:22

that, it makes his whole system one where

33:24

we can just pick components from all over

33:26

the place. try things out, drop them in

33:28

replace things poor whole sections, our replace of

33:30

a whole other sections and it means that

33:32

we get a build the exact game we

33:34

want to build for the table and for

33:36

the players that we have running out at

33:38

so it's a were a powerful idea. I

33:40

wanted to highlight that idea kind of hopefully

33:42

give that's use a you think I think

33:44

differently about what says addition actually is and

33:46

that recognize that Citizen can be a unique

33:48

Rpg system that each of us build for

33:50

our table from the wide range of components

33:52

that are out there. I hope that that

33:55

was kind of a useful way of thinking

33:57

about the game. Let's. Do

33:59

some patriot class. In every Friday morning I

34:01

sit down and I answer all of the

34:03

questions that are there on Patriots. Some of

34:05

those questions make their way here to the

34:07

talk show, other ones become the catalyst for

34:10

articles or other videos on their own. All

34:12

of the questions are also captured in the

34:14

sly flourish Peter on Q and a database

34:16

a database of more than seventeen hundred questions

34:18

and answers that I have parsed from Patriotic

34:20

put into a system so that patrons concerts

34:22

on various topics and find all of the

34:25

previous classes that I've talked about for the

34:27

past two and a half years. They're all

34:29

available there to days. First question is

34:31

from Madman Quail if you are creating

34:33

a new Twenty Twenty Fourth, Z T

34:35

T Only addition for Return of the

34:38

Lazy Dm. Focus on virtual games and

34:40

updated for Twenty Twenty Four, What sections

34:42

of the eight Steps and the rest

34:44

of the book would you add? Change?

34:46

Caught or emphasize very little. So.

34:50

One of the nice things about the eight

34:52

steps and this was by design. This is

34:54

something that I had considered when I was

34:56

working on. It was saying to myself more.

34:58

I wanted the Aids deaths in a one

35:00

of the prep process to be independent of

35:03

the way and of that the media and

35:05

the medium that you used to do the

35:07

prep for. You could do it on pen

35:09

and paper. You could do it in notepad.

35:11

You could do it in a fancy or

35:14

two of you could do it for online

35:16

games. He could do it for offline games

35:18

he could do of rain person games you

35:20

could do it's any kind again that you're

35:22

running. I wanted those eight steps to work

35:24

regardless of what system you had. So I

35:27

don't think and I haven't changed the eight

35:29

steps. I myself switched from be one hundred

35:31

per cent in person to one hundred percent

35:33

online to now about fifty fifty low that

35:35

the the on red around fifty fifty. I

35:38

switch tools multiple times. I went from physical

35:40

paper to notepad and just markdown and in

35:42

text files to Notion and to Obsidian and

35:44

I've been able to use the Eight Stephanie.

35:46

it's necessary me just as well in those

35:49

places as others and they have served many

35:51

others. Somebody today posted a thing that was

35:53

showing how they're using Thrilla like a Trelleborg

35:55

to do the eight steps. You can use

35:57

these eight steps in any to any application.

36:00

That you want whether it's pen and paper

36:02

all the way up through fancy database, back

36:04

to website kind of stuff or other tools.

36:06

So I wouldn't say the eight steps. I

36:08

didn't have very much experience with online games

36:10

when I wrote returned, but I did when

36:12

I wrote the Lazy Dm Companion. The company

36:14

was written right in the middle a cove

36:16

it's and I had about a year of

36:18

running online games exclusively and I was spending

36:20

a lot of time and attention. Talking.

36:22

About and listening to and learning from C

36:24

M's or running online games. I have a

36:26

one page guide and the least idioms companion

36:28

that talks about playing Rpgs online. how to

36:30

choose the right tools, how to set up

36:32

audio video. I and I have some opinionated

36:34

recommendations here like don't worry about how they

36:36

roll, I let the role physical dies let

36:39

them role of virtual dice. It really doesn't

36:41

matter. Try not to get on your players

36:43

too much about trying to roll one particular

36:45

way. I talk about com and tactical pitfalls.

36:47

What are some areas where video and audio

36:49

chat can kind of breakdowns? What are some

36:51

etiquette and actually. As any, D has a

36:53

fantastic video that I often reference for good behavior

36:55

for online play but I talk about it here

36:57

as well. I think I wrote this before she

37:00

had done her video adventure she would have cause

37:02

I would a reference if I had but how

37:04

did the what are some ways that you can

37:06

make sure that when you are talking online. That

37:09

you're not going over taught how to share visuals

37:11

on the different ways to serve vigils and I

37:13

try to make sure that this is also Tulips

37:15

and an agnostic as well. So I didn't assume

37:18

you're running a heavy Btc like Sound Real Role

37:20

Twenty or a lightweight V D T like the

37:22

Dd Beyond Maps Tool or Alba Rodeo, but instead

37:24

talk about hey, there's lots of different ways as

37:26

you can share visuals. And then I have my

37:28

text based combat tracker. This is still something I'm

37:30

working on and seizing but we have a recommendation

37:32

here for like how you can keep track of

37:34

combat One Need Things that I've done as I

37:36

now have a way to kind of do a

37:38

text based combat. Tracker that includes initiative and it

37:41

is well see can have initiative You can f

37:43

tracking of monster damage. You can have tracking

37:45

of location if you're running aisle seat or

37:47

the mine style an abstract math style and

37:49

have it all in one. Block so

37:51

that you don't have to really the treat. The have

37:53

a whole lot of problems going on like them. So.

37:56

I don't think that I would change much. One

37:59

so I. The amount here's my opinion is just

38:01

my opinion and I get yelled at. I get people to

38:03

yell at me and I know you're gonna yell. Some people

38:05

are going to yell and if you're good with the you're

38:07

good with. Rights. I

38:09

look at the so you're not going with it.

38:12

I know that D M T M spend a

38:14

ton of time getting their maps ready for virtual

38:16

tabletop and I hear people say I've heard people

38:18

say that it is a limiting factor in their

38:20

ability to run games as they don't have time

38:22

to set up their maps and get and particularly

38:24

get all of the lighting effects set up. That

38:26

getting the dynamic lighting effects takes a long time,

38:28

drawing lines around everything, getting all the blocks us

38:30

right, making sure it's all working fine. Testing at

38:32

all outs that that is a lot of work.

38:35

There are some people who feel like that that

38:37

is really critical. They these are gotten their players.

38:39

Used to and the players don't want to play any

38:41

other way or they just like it and they don't

38:43

want to plane and away and that's fine. but when

38:45

it's getting in a way of you having time to

38:47

prep your game, when it's getting a way of the

38:49

what I consider be the other elements of the game,

38:51

they're gonna have a bigger impact to the games or

38:53

for limiting your ability to run games in general. I

38:55

would take a hard look at whether you need to

38:58

do that and instead use a simpler way of sharing.

39:00

Visuals use more abstract math. Don't worry about applying to

39:02

the grid, You know there's lots of ways as you

39:04

can streamline grid play. It's very opinionated on my part

39:06

and I know there are people that that wanna play

39:08

at a certain. Way I'm not saying if the

39:10

give it a mask completely but you can certainly

39:12

let go of the grid a little bit and

39:15

let go of dynamic lighting. A little bit scared

39:17

he just share copy and paste over discord you

39:19

don't even need to of he did he in

39:21

a lot of circumstances and I think you can

39:23

save you a ton of time. I know because

39:26

I've done it both ways. I've I've built maps

39:28

or I did all the dynamic lighting and everything

39:30

for them. and I've done wonder I use of

39:32

very very rudimentary old school style of Fog of

39:35

War and that worked just fine. And it was

39:37

much much faster. and Albert Rodeo I. Did

39:39

a video where I set up every

39:41

level of Castle Raven Loss which is

39:43

like the most you know challenging dungeon

39:45

to run in, just a car, assassin

39:47

or to and I had a whole

39:49

map up and running and ready to

39:51

go for my own game. and like

39:53

under fifteen minutes for every level that

39:55

they had. so you can do it

39:57

much faster. So think about how to

39:59

optimize. Your yard your time setting up map

40:01

because I think the more complicated it is the

40:04

more time it's taking. Any really have to ask

40:06

like is emi better off spending my time making

40:08

sure all the dynamic lighting is working rights or

40:10

my better off thinking about the characters and what

40:12

they want to do and that what kind of

40:15

encounters I can build for them that are going

40:17

to really show off their capabilities of make them

40:19

look cool and drive their story further into the

40:21

game. I bet you. More. Time

40:23

spent focusing on the characters and their interface to

40:26

the game is gonna be more valuable than the

40:28

time he spent of them than emigrating. That's just

40:30

my opinion man. your opinion may be different. You're

40:32

not playing Ron Nothing, you're playing wrong. But that

40:35

to me as something that I've seen and I've

40:37

heard about for many Dm I've heard of where

40:39

people get on me and say sued a my

40:41

games. I absolutely have to have dynamic lighting, a

40:44

map. But. Also, it's taking me like three hours

40:46

to set up an hour have enough time so I don't run

40:48

as many games. I'm not italia like if

40:50

you're missing games a surprised if you're missing days

40:52

or something to consider. But. As

40:54

like my penance Rainbow of Ringo says typically

40:57

and a high fantasy story the heroes of

40:59

be successful in the end the victory may

41:01

not be complete, sacrifices will have to be

41:03

made but ultimately surrounded like will be vanquished.

41:06

been in a game, the possibility failures always

41:08

there, how to use satisfyingly and a campaign

41:10

where the Pcs failed without having the Pcs

41:12

feel like failures is really tough and I

41:15

can offer up again you ask me and

41:17

I have opinions. I am not one to

41:19

hang onto the idea that sale your needs

41:21

to be such a clear state. That.

41:24

I'm not willing to turn those dials heavily

41:27

in the characters favor. At the end of

41:29

the campaign, I want them to succeed. I

41:31

want him to be challenged. I want them

41:33

to feel like they're on the ropes. But

41:36

I also wanted to succeed. and I think

41:38

that's were having your hands on the dials

41:40

to. really leaning towards that because it's the

41:42

end. You just don't want to have a

41:45

flat failure. At the end

41:47

of a big campaign like that would suck.

41:49

It would just suck Now another way though,

41:51

as if you do want to build kind

41:53

of a final battle or something where you

41:55

definitely want failure to be an option is

41:57

set to come up with another state. If

42:00

they fail this battle. What

42:02

will happen that could be as

42:04

cool or cooler than if they

42:06

succeeded. I'll give you an example.

42:08

I ran a Orcas a game

42:10

where they have fourth edition game

42:12

where they were fighting orcas and I

42:14

made the battle really hard and

42:16

my idea was if they wipe

42:18

out. And. They could.

42:21

I'm. Going to have the characters wake up.

42:23

I'm going to end the game with

42:25

the characters waking up Ten years later.

42:27

Dug out about Charnel Pets. From.

42:29

A bunch of cultists, the who worship the

42:31

characters as the sort of like Last Deities.

42:34

Oh, you're the heroes I used to be.

42:36

Nobody believes you exist anymore, but we do.

42:38

We remember your tales, we've You know, we've

42:40

brought it. and we're bringing you back because

42:42

Orcas has now been ruling over the world

42:44

and ruling over the multiverse for ten years

42:46

and it's terrible and you're the only ones

42:48

have ever been able to face him again

42:50

and then turn it into and kind of

42:52

a new campaign where the characters are starting

42:54

off i don't identify, keep him at the

42:56

same level or whatever, but the starting off

42:58

a new campaign. Where now they're living in

43:00

the world Where Orcas one and actually stole that

43:03

idea again when I was running my rises here

43:05

that game where is t about one I was

43:07

gonna have the same thing happened that called us.

43:09

We're going to wake up the characters them say

43:11

it's been a hundred years and he in that

43:14

has been ruling over the sword coast but we

43:16

dug you out or maybe I was going to

43:18

have possessed ham resurrect them and in and kind

43:20

of bring them into the Red Wizards of Say

43:23

and say we have been trying to fight the

43:25

for city of and now we want We've resurrected

43:27

you to act as our heroes to go and.

43:29

Stops him at and kind of turn it

43:31

back around again. And I thought those endings

43:34

those sailed endings were almost cooler than the

43:36

good endings. Says he could come up with

43:38

a failure ending that's even better than the

43:40

good ending. That's one way to do it,

43:42

another way is really just mean and towards

43:45

them not failing right? And I know at

43:47

all. But it matters. failure as the matter.

43:49

yadda yadda yadda. Does it?

43:51

Like. Just l give them a good

43:54

ending. Man like obsesses a the plane like

43:56

a year and a half. Give him a

43:58

good ending government girl. Any

44:00

that works now, maybe you put in opportunities

44:02

for like sacrifice, all you're gonna lose. However,

44:04

if one of you is willing to do

44:06

this one thing and give yourself up for

44:09

the, everybody else will survivor everyday. Also be

44:11

able to defeat the bad guy. I had

44:13

characters who made sacrifices like that and a

44:15

last minute a mic. And and in a

44:17

campaign. and when you're building that lasts a

44:19

big climactic battle or big climactic circumstance, ask

44:21

yourself where those opportunities are for sacrifice. Ask

44:24

yourself what the opportunity as if it goes

44:26

south and and they lose. Build those in.

44:28

Spend that his party or prep time that

44:30

you know that. Yes, I'm gonna be running

44:32

them through the wringer. And

44:34

they might sale. and if they do. This is what

44:36

happens when you don't want to have happen as get

44:39

caught flat footed on that failure. You don't want to

44:41

have them sale at the end of a campaign and

44:43

you didn't know what was going to happen and now

44:45

it's like well you all died. Sox right?

44:47

You don't want to have that be the end of

44:49

a campaign and not after that players and you have

44:51

invested, You know, sometimes years of your life trying to

44:54

get it into the right spots. That's what I would

44:56

do. I would that would mean and you know you

44:58

can make a really hard, but with your hands on

45:00

the dials you can also make it really hard, but

45:02

also make it that it's pretty unlikely. The characters are

45:04

totally gonna lose. Or. You

45:06

can also say if they do lose, here's what's

45:08

gonna happen and it's good to be pretty cool

45:11

to. Or you could say yeah, if they're losing,

45:13

they can do this one thing the whole of

45:15

the make the sacrifice. but it's a make that

45:17

sacrifice. They'll be able to turn things around. Those

45:19

are those are really the big options that

45:22

you have their so hopefully that helps. Adam

45:24

G. says I've been struggling with making engaging

45:26

a dynamic environment for combat recently, especially if

45:28

one flying Pc and another who's just picked

45:30

up a flying broomstick? How do you make

45:33

interesting and dynamic combat environments that don't always

45:35

involve adding a roof when half the party

45:37

can fly? Sturges. Next. Question smell.

45:39

So yeah a few things and there's a

45:42

few different ways that you can deal with.

45:44

It's what is. Flying is really not as

45:46

good as the Perfect cause lots of monsters

45:48

can fly and also loss of monsters have

45:51

raised tax and also creatures that are

45:53

flying are really easy to see and target

45:55

and hit with reigns attacks. So one important

45:57

point I would make is that. Monsters

46:00

have evolved in a world where there's lots

46:02

of flying creatures. so makes sense that monsters

46:04

would have ways to deal with flying creatures.

46:07

I know that there are monsters who don't.

46:09

Another big tip, but so what? So the

46:11

first big tip is, consider that. Both

46:14

intelligence and unintelligent creatures have been dealing with

46:16

flying things for a long time. They're not

46:18

going to be surprised by things that can

46:20

fly. So what have they done to prepare

46:22

for Things that can fly? Does the odds

46:24

yard have a giant slingshot that it uses

46:26

to knock up out of the sky so

46:29

that he can eat? It may be, so

46:31

I don't think it's out a hand to

46:33

have creatures that are used to having things

46:35

that can fly night maybe every single time,

46:37

but a lot of the time because there's

46:39

lots of other things in the world that

46:41

slime of the both humanoids. An intelligent creatures.

46:44

And dumb monsters all would have evolved. In a

46:46

world where things can fly, they would not be

46:48

surprised by thing. second thoughts Now mechanically something you

46:50

can do which I do is even if the

46:52

creature doesn't have a ranged attack on us that

46:54

block you can go ahead and give it one.

46:57

You can basically look at the same stats at

46:59

a has for any kind of melee attack and

47:01

just three in it into a ranged attack and

47:03

letter to ranged attacks. Your trolls can throw things

47:05

you're giants can always. I think the giants always

47:07

can throw things anyway, but like your Ah Tian

47:10

could hurl stuff with has been tentacles. So go

47:12

ahead and kim modify your monsters. On the fly

47:14

to give them ranged attacks when they don't

47:16

have them because again it would make sense

47:19

that they would have them. Either that or

47:21

they'd have a way to get away from

47:23

the flying creatures and harry ground creatures without

47:25

having to worry about flying creatures. So that's

47:27

that's number two and number three in of

47:30

put him he is a nod and involving

47:32

a roof because involve a roof but you

47:34

can also have a high Magic Things to

47:36

sell. Castles will definitely be protected from aerial

47:38

attackers because it made sense said that they

47:41

have aerial attackers right? Like the tassels in

47:43

the Middle Ages, we didn't have to worry

47:45

about things flying in, Galileo had invented the

47:47

hang gliders yet rights they didn't worry about

47:50

you know, aerial attacks but if they had

47:52

dragons and they had giant bad as they

47:54

had he of Time Air as and other

47:56

things they definitely would have. They would definitely

47:58

have Big Ass Cross. Those sitting up on

48:00

the ramparts issue things down. They would have wizards

48:03

who can throw her a lightning bolts of things.

48:05

They would have magical effects. Second, his stuff in

48:07

the sky so they would not be under scented

48:09

like this. This thousand sauce really to flying either.

48:12

This relates to a lot of spells we talk

48:14

about. Speak with that all. How can anybody ever

48:16

murder anybody else and speak with that? Israel will

48:18

guess what murderers have learned about. speak with dead

48:20

in the same way we have murders now who

48:23

know about how to hide their evidence. People that

48:25

would know about speak with that would have murders

48:27

would know to avoid being seen by the person

48:29

they're killing or. Making sure that the bodies that

48:31

they have the people that they killed can't speak

48:33

they would figure that out in this. The same

48:35

is true with flying creatures. So think about what

48:38

the wow the world would evolve to deal with

48:40

the fact that there are flying creatures know. also

48:42

don't punish them for picking flying if they decided

48:44

to fly. let them get advantages are flying just

48:46

not necessarily all the time so have with of

48:48

gives you some ideas about ways that you can

48:50

continue to. Three characters who Fly Dainty says I

48:52

run my weekly game on Tuesday so last night

48:54

around a game is one of those rare sessions

48:56

or my place all had a good time but

48:58

I did not. I rolled poorly. The whole night

49:01

for none of my masters cool abilities went off

49:03

at all. I was using Google Boreal and Dead

49:05

from Flee Mortals. The characters acted scared, but honestly

49:07

there is nothing we can have. initiative elicited that

49:09

fear. The players did not get to see any

49:11

of their scary abilities so walk away feeling like

49:13

my session was a failure. I

49:16

was thinking about my and counterbalance didn't did not use

49:18

enough monsters Are that I didn't I not use enough

49:20

monsters in the light wondering what I did that resulted

49:22

in me feeling was he a failure This essence my

49:24

players into feel the opposite and been a long time

49:26

since I've had assessing like this and generally when these

49:28

kind assistance happen it's when a sign that maybe the

49:30

campaign is not working anymore. What do you do when

49:32

you have assessing that you feel when awful and you

49:34

didn't have much fun versus the players having lots of

49:36

fun. Do you think this means that the campaign it's

49:38

just and or start a new one of the campaign?

49:40

Question is a different issue like that when you really

49:42

need to sit and think about like are you still

49:44

have fun with a campaign and if. You're not. Are

49:46

there ways that you can change the nature the

49:48

campaign in order to make it fun for you

49:50

again? I talked about this and previous questions. You

49:53

can you can look them up in the queue

49:55

in a database but that idea of like do

49:57

need to see her timpani that sort of a

49:59

separate ones. In my case my monsters are

50:01

sock then I felt bad but my players

50:03

had a good time. I had the exact

50:05

same thing happened and I wasn't using we mortals.

50:07

I was using free month for to foes

50:09

monsters where I was like oh I'm going

50:11

have a great big battle. I knew that the

50:14

characters had some big advantages on their side

50:16

in the name of to frost giant zombies that

50:18

they could control so I knew they had

50:20

like really big stuff. They are also level

50:22

thirteen. I had no idea how much power the

50:24

characters could put out and they went through

50:26

I think three times the deadly threshold worth

50:28

of ghouls in or it's it. Was alongside

50:30

but they just destroyed them And

50:32

that and in one tastes we

50:35

had a cleric who was using

50:37

a sunbeam. A sunbeam. That sunbeam

50:39

some and will save some be using a sunbeam

50:41

and it was creating a radiant sun sun filled

50:43

area around him. Them and all of the goals

50:46

are attacking were disadvantaged and is a C was

50:48

like twenty three. say we're just never going to

50:50

hit him and he'd do is concentrate elsa he

50:52

was he would have advantage on concentration, sex or

50:55

even of i meditate on the likely to be

50:57

able to knock the concentration us was basically zero

50:59

I had to try to bag a creature try

51:01

to put darkness on up at the we all

51:04

dogs about a realize that know darkness would even

51:06

work on us and I was like wow they.

51:08

Will on this battle. it was tons and

51:11

tons and tons of powerful monsters. It was

51:13

like six see our fives and five see

51:15

our rates. You know time and

51:17

and piles and piles of see our once

51:19

and they just destroy them. They had a

51:22

really good time and I when I wish

51:24

I had done was realize what they were

51:26

doing and leaned into that in my description

51:28

and for me to get excited about how

51:30

this was their moment to literally sign in

51:32

this empire of the ghouls and just destroying

51:34

as many ghouls as they were and they

51:36

were bringing that fun on their own Anyway

51:38

I was always like now haven't to easier

51:40

time with this but the reality is they

51:42

were having a great time and I wish

51:44

I just had that same great time with

51:46

them. I do think that the more

51:48

mechanically crunchy the monsters are the worse we feel

51:50

when they don't get their stuff off and that's

51:52

a particular problem with we mortals. It's a problem

51:55

that I had and forth addition to the fourth

51:57

edition. monsters had tons of stuff that they could

51:59

do and many times they get some locked and

52:01

they would never have the opportunity to. It's I

52:03

don't worry about south with for to foes monsters

52:05

because they don't have anything. I'm improvising most of

52:07

it anyway. So I'd I'd made the monster up

52:09

ten seconds ago and like the fact that they

52:12

don't get to do a lot of the medical,

52:14

they didn't do a lot in the first place.

52:16

so the simpler the months their the less I

52:18

care if they don't have any big effect so

52:20

that's something to consider. But it does mean when

52:22

you do have bc juicy monsters that have cool

52:24

abilities, you want to see those abilities goth, turn

52:26

the dial. The let them get some of those

52:29

abilities off, Let them. Roll with advantage. Have them

52:31

get you know, give them some opportunities to

52:33

do it. give them more attacks until their

52:35

attack actually manages the hits. Seat Man for

52:37

those cool monsters are you want to see

52:39

the thing the players want to see it

52:41

to. Don't see too much but you could

52:43

see the little bit in order to have

52:45

like a monster actually be a threat. But

52:47

you can also learn from this fight. This

52:49

is what I did as I learned from

52:51

that fight and what I realize is that

52:53

more bigger monsters is just not enough once

52:55

the characters cross thirteen playable. I've been in

52:57

a different kinds of monsters, different kinds of

52:59

abilities, different kinds. Of status effects, different kinds

53:01

of opportunities, and environmental effects that are going

53:03

to give some advantages to the monstrous. To

53:05

be able to deal with a tremendous amount

53:08

of power asymmetric power that the characters are

53:10

be able to bring to the table once

53:12

they hit these really high levels, I think

53:14

there's some break points where this happens. Fifth

53:16

level is one where all this on the

53:19

characters a lot more powerful. seventh level, eleventh

53:21

level, thirteen level, and so on. And like

53:23

every bout two or three levels, the characters

53:25

hit a point where they have new abilities

53:27

that they didn't have before like when the

53:29

pollen. Is is able to give everybody nearby

53:31

a big boon to saving throws that changes.

53:34

that's as it's an asymmetric seems. the saving

53:36

throws of the characters now got significantly better.

53:38

It's like sealed for saving throws only to

53:40

everybody, right? That's a really big deal. The

53:42

minute that they are able to to be

53:44

grant like get really high armor classes and

53:46

make the creatures attack with disadvantage a lot.

53:48

It doesn't matter how big they are, they're

53:50

still missing often. So what do you do

53:52

about that? Have you seen says things up

53:54

though the around. Really seeing a big things

53:56

that we have to consider when we're challenging

53:58

high level characters. That's my challenging high level

54:00

characters is really hard metal. A lot of

54:02

people never even reached the timer them hitting

54:05

hello characters again. I hope that helps and

54:07

I hope you continue with your campaign and

54:09

a hobby. Really have fun with it. But

54:11

slugs as the of these sessions where we

54:13

feel bad player so good. focus on the

54:15

fact that they felt good and then news.

54:17

The bad part is a learning experience about

54:19

what you want to do next time. Chris

54:22

H. says he recently mention what magic I he

54:24

give your players a certain level milestones something like

54:26

uncommon, a fourth, rare, and eleven success. To have

54:29

a quick rule for magic items bi level for

54:31

both creation and campaigns, I have a player who's

54:33

Pc is forging a magic item. were following the

54:35

rules that we agreed to earlier about this ability

54:38

to enhance the ability plus one positive plus three.

54:40

Based on Helen as guide to the and now

54:42

that the campaign is nearing it's final chapter, we

54:44

want to make sure he gets to finish his

54:46

paw three weapon at the right time. I would

54:49

not worry about trying to stay too closely to

54:51

the uncommon. Rare and very rare items

54:53

that those level ranges. I use random generators

54:55

a lot to do treasure and sometimes they

54:57

get items that are more powerful. When I'm

54:59

starting to customize them though, I will jump

55:01

to those rarities. Were like once they're above

55:03

sea level it's not a bad time to

55:05

start thinking about them getting close to freedoms

55:07

once they cross eleventh level. Now it's time

55:09

to get plus three and once they cross

55:11

like cities or sixteen. now you can start

55:13

thinking about given like legendary weapons but I

55:15

I would hang on loosely. Most of it

55:17

is when you look at a magic item

55:19

you have to ask yourself is this gonna

55:21

break the. Campaign or make my life

55:24

harder. When I run this campaign there

55:26

are certain items like the the the

55:28

instrument of the bard's. Like

55:30

I don't really give those out because they

55:32

changed the game so much. They become such

55:34

a powerful magical item that they change how

55:37

the whole game operates. So you almost want

55:39

to look at the items and say. Like

55:41

if I give this out, is this gonna

55:43

have an effect So great that it's going

55:45

to change how my game goes generally. speaking

55:47

of Muslim plus two plus three is not

55:49

I would worry about giving out. I don't

55:51

ever give our magic shields that have a

55:53

plus bonus because I feel like once you

55:55

stack a shield with a plus bonus on

55:57

top of armor the plus bonus you break

55:59

the bounded the of armor class. enemies are

56:01

never gonna get hits and god help you

56:03

if they get sealed on top of that

56:05

the spell shield another like a twenty nine

56:07

a seat. There are definitely players out there

56:09

whose goal is to optimize Ac as much

56:11

as humanly possible. I do not want to

56:13

give than those advantages I'm usually pretty rare

56:16

to about offering magic items that have big

56:18

plus bonuses on armor. I might do it

56:20

for smaller stuff. Studded leather yeah my give

56:22

like a plus two bonus on that's lower

56:24

armor. I like to get lower armor with

56:26

higher plus bonuses but then I was get

56:28

a player like can I have plate. Can I

56:30

turn the is a plate and know you don't get plus

56:32

to plate man sorry to ask you a look at a

56:34

base of twenty a c plus the fact that you have.

56:38

So you want to ask yourself like is this

56:40

gonna really hurt the game Weapons like A plus

56:42

three bonus on a weapon that's not so bad

56:44

When you have things like plus to the six

56:47

damage on every weapon attack that can be a

56:49

lot So I think like the flames hung, I

56:51

get enough lanes on swords. I usually only give

56:53

them out in a method that the characters who

56:55

gets them are not your fighters who were going

56:58

to be able to get six attacks around reusing.

57:00

Action Surge and be able to get those

57:02

extra feel twelve the six fire damage because

57:04

a Because they got itself look at the

57:06

items you're giving out ask yourself is is

57:08

really going to break the game and aware

57:10

become so powerful, so optimal. That is going

57:13

to totally changed how the game operates or

57:15

really make this character out of the way

57:17

more powerful than every other character that exist

57:19

in there. that something to consider otherwise I

57:21

wouldn't worry too much about trying to stay

57:23

towards the uncommon rare and very rare items.

57:25

At the particular tears, you don't have to

57:27

hang on to that system too much and

57:29

instead. Absolutely give them the plus three weapons that

57:32

they have time to enjoy. It. Friends. I

57:34

would think all of the for hang out with

57:36

me today while we talked about all things and

57:38

tabletop roleplaying games. I hope you enjoyed the show.

57:41

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