Dungeon Craft: Critical Role, Pokemon, and the Future of D&D

[Tulpa Girl]

Even when I was playing a ridiculously min-maxed Bladesinger.

Oh, so you're the one!

 

[Fenris-77]

Oh, so you're the one!

One of many. Do you hear that sound? The pitter patter of oncoming Gish nonsense? That, Mr. Anderson, is the sound of inevitability.

 

[TristramEvans]

Oh, so you're the one!

 

[Fenris-77]

The Wardancers were always a favorite unit of mine WHFB. Very cool. Bladesingers, OTOH, can suck the pain pipe.

 

[Ladybird]

Then again, I have no data. I actually wonder what percentage of DMs is totally enthusiastic about "all Mos Eisley Cantina all the time" campaigns.

D&D's never been a humans-only game though; if we go back to the original, in terms of clearly sentient races, we have humans, dwarves, elves, cavemen, mermen, goblins, kobolds, orcs, hobgoblins, gnolls, ogres, trolls, giants, medusae, gargoyles, lycanthropes, centaurs, nixies, pixies, dryads, gnomes, treants, invisible stalkers, djinn, efreet; and there are a few others you could make arguments for, like the higher undead. If we go to the anecdotes, then remember that someone played a balrog. It's been "Mos Eisley cantina" from the beginning.

I'm going to make an argument based on a gut feeling rather than any logic or data, so forgive me: The more options WotC slides into the core and the more kitchen sink philosophy it tacitly encourages, the less unique the setting you try to create in contrast to all that can actually be.

Subtraction is a very valuable tool in creating true uniqueness. Less is often more.

Honestly, I doubt most groups really care about creating a particularly unique fantasy world, more having enough setting that they can do some adventures in and have a decent game, because that's what they need.

 

[Shipyard Locked]

I don't think that's a bad thing though, only that the hobby has to adapt to compete with other media. But wasn't this always the case?

It's getting harder, that's for sure. I guess I have no right to whine.

 

[Shipyard Locked]

Honestly, I doubt most groups really care about creating a particularly unique fantasy world, more having enough setting that they can do some adventures in and have a decent game, because that's what they need.

This is the hardest thing to internalize. I would be so much less conflicted, so much more productive if I'd just accept this truth instead of striving for pretentious artsy criteria all the time.

 

[Brock Savage]

I am noticing a definite generation gap in my group. Myself and the other experienced player in their 40's have a strong preference for B/X. The young players had their 1st taste of D&D with 5e and have a preference for that. The Mrs says the old school characters are weak and shitty commoners and she likes having more options in a round besides "I hit it with my sword". The little subsystems in BX drive the players nuts ("I thought rolling high was always good!"). That said all the players like the old school spirit like high lethality, slower advancement, xp for treasure, encumbrance, etc

 

[CRKrueger]

Got rid of D&D with 2.5.
Came back for 3.0, then...Nope.
Came back for Conan d20, then...oh MRQ2 is pretty badass.
Took a look at 4.0...Oh HELL no.
Tried 5.0...Meh, too much 4.0 under the hood.

I’ve pretty much accepted at this point that WotC design paradigm for D&D will not produce a game I can run. They’ve turned D&D into a Genre RPG of itself, and I don’t find the genre tropes useful. 3.0 and 5.0 could be run, but all the races and classes have to be exploded and reconstituted. Just not enough there to justify the work.

 

[EmperorNorton]

Also, to be honest, I find lethality has much more to do with what characters come up against than what is on their sheets.

If you are finding that 5e characters are too durable, just up the threats you are throwing at them. It's not like you have to use 3 goblins because 3 goblins was enough of a challenge back in OD&D.

 

[A Fiery Flying Roll]

Hardcore RPGer who plays D&D is a contradiction anyway. As any hipster can tell you, if it's popular you're mainstream. ;)

 

[Fenris-77]

I am noticing a definite generation gap in my group. Myself and the other experienced player in their 40's have a strong preference for B/X. The young players had their 1st taste of D&D with 5e and have a preference for that. The Mrs says the old school characters are weak and shitty commoners and she likes having more options in a round besides "I hit it with my sword". The little subsystems in BX drive the players nuts ("I thought rolling high was always good!"). That said all the players like the old school spirit like high lethality, slower advancement, xp for treasure, encumbrance, etc

This is why I prefer some of the other OSR games over straight B/X. You keep the spirit but get to play a with a rationalized and update set of mechanics. Not that I dislike B/X, I like it a lot, but it does have some idiosyncrasies that I can happily live without.

 

[EmperorNorton]

Hardcore RPGer who plays D&D is a contradiction anyway. As any hipster can tell you, if it's popular you're mainstream. ;)

Honestly, every time I've played D&D in the last decade was because it's the easiest thing to find games for/get players for.

 

[Tommy Brownell]

I can only speak to 2nd edition, but we were pretty fragile until at least 5th-6th level. Even when I was playing a ridiculously min-maxed Bladesinger.

Levels 1-2 in 5e are made of paper. In 2e, wizards feared housecats. In 5e, we had a monk get owned by a kobold.

 

[Bunch]

I’m always stunned at this whole “5e characters are invincible” take. I ran two campaigns and had a 75% death rate across the two parties (one was a TPK).

This. Hps don't seem so inflated. I've DM'd fights where none of the opponents had any real chance of hitting the PCs but with enough of them, someone always roles a crit which given the not too inflated hit points brings PCs down pretty quickly. Now on the other side the PCs seem pretty capable of hitting and killing with one hit each of those little bastards so it has been over all very satisfying for both me and the players. They don't take combat for granted, but they feel pretty badass at the same time.

It helps if you describe one shots kills and head or limbs flying across the room/area, clubs crushing skulls or entire chest cavities, etc.

For all my dislikes of Waterdeep Dragon Heist it does have excellent opportunities for pure role-playing sessions backed up to satisfying combat sessions.

 

[tenbones]

D&D's never been a humans-only game though; if we go back to the original, in terms of clearly sentient races, we have humans, dwarves, elves, cavemen, mermen, goblins, kobolds, orcs, hobgoblins, gnolls, ogres, trolls, giants, medusae, gargoyles, lycanthropes, centaurs, nixies, pixies, dryads, gnomes, treants, invisible stalkers, djinn, efreet; and there are a few others you could make arguments for, like the higher undead. If we go to the anecdotes, then remember that someone played a balrog. It's been "Mos Eisley cantina" from the beginning.

I have a nearly complete selection of D&D material from Moldvay though 3e and most of 5e (some 4e).

What *setting* are you referring to from "the beginning"? If you're saying some homebrew then I've got little to say. I don't know of any of the big settings that came out in 1e that assumed those species outside of the PC races were *common*. Mos Eisley's cantina is literally a bar where you can walk in and assume you'd see a Snivelin, Rodian, or any other Star Wars species in there. I'm not familiar where in Greyhawk, Realms, Dragonlance, Mystara where it would be "normal" to walk into any given bar and find Ogres, Trolls, Hobgoblins, Medusa etc.

Are there places where such folk might be found in these settings? Sure. Is it normal? No. Not by any standard of "normal" I've ever entertained. It would be a bloodbath.

Let's not conflate the existence of such things as outliers to the assumptions of the game vs. the settings the game has produced. Homebrew is of course off limits since... it's homebrew. There ARE settings where I would completely agree with you that seeing such folks in the same place would be normal:

Spelljammer, Planescape, MAYBE in certain locales within the Realms: Skullport, maybe Calimport? But writ-large? Nope.

Honestly, I doubt most groups really care about creating a particularly unique fantasy world, more having enough setting that they can do some adventures in and have a decent game, because that's what they need.

I'd say generally speaking, most groups just run adventure modules without giving much thought to anything outside of the parameters of the module - and are informed mostly by whatever the current ruleset says is playable content. Which is why we have this disconnect between setting vs. game allowances.

 

[Bunch]

I have a nearly complete selection of D&D material from Moldvay though 3e and most of 5e (some 4e).

What *setting* are you referring to from "the beginning"? If you're saying some homebrew then I've got little to say. I don't know of any of the big settings that came out in 1e that assumed those species outside of the PC races were *common*. Mos Eisley's cantina is literally a bar where you can walk in and assume you'd see a Snivelin, Rodian, or any other Star Wars species in there. I'm not familiar where in Greyhawk, Realms, Dragonlance, Mystara where it would be "normal" to walk into any given bar and find Ogres, Trolls, Hobgoblins, Medusa etc.

Are there places where such folk might be found in these settings? Sure. Is it normal? No. Not by any standard of "normal" I've ever entertained. It would be a bloodbath.

Let's not conflate the existence of such things as outliers to the assumptions of the game vs. the settings the game has produced. Homebrew is of course off limits since... it's homebrew. There ARE settings where I would completely agree with you that seeing such folks in the same place would be normal:

Spelljammer, Planescape, MAYBE in certain locales within the Realms: Skullport, maybe Calimport? But writ-large? Nope.




I'd say generally speaking, most groups just run adventure modules without giving much thought to anything outside of the parameters of the module - and are informed mostly by whatever the current ruleset says is playable content. Which is why we have this disconnect between setting vs. game allowances.

I get the sense that Waterdeep is pretty cosmopolitan with regards to demi humans.

 

[Shipyard Locked]

Hardcore RPGer who plays D&D is a contradiction anyway. As any hipster can tell you, if it's popular you're mainstream. ;)

I was here before the mainstream cliques deigned to make D&D 'cool', I'll be here after they move on to the next shiny object.

 

[zanshin]

Have played Basic, AD&D, 3e, 3.5e, Midnights take on 3e, 4e & 5e. Played 2e only through PC games (thank you Baldurs gate et al). Have roleplayed since 1979.

5e hits my sweet spot, and I am happy with the Mos Eisley Cantina approach. My wife greatly enjoyed playing a Tabaxi Bard (sentient cat person) and it was a straightforward hook for her roleplay.

I prefer a genre of fantasy with heroes who are more capable. 5e delivers that very well.

I have done the survival D&D thing, and it's not my preferred form of play for face to face games - I prefer action to inaction, and everything slowing to a crawl as you cautiously analyze your environment is not what I enjoy in RPGS. But there clearly are many people who do enjoy that playstyle.

Face to face roleplaying is a difficult thing to make come together - it's my favourite form of entertainment, when everything aligns. I appreciate the frustration that people can feel that our hobby can be very fractured, and you can't find people to play the version of the game that you prefer. Back 'in the day' a magazine like White Dwarf could do articles about D&D, Traveller & Runequest and know that it was offering something relevant to 95% of its readership. Now the player base is potentially split among 1000's of games, and at least 10 versions of D&D that have a significant following.

All I would say as that IME to GM, it really helps to be excited about the setting and/or system to help involve the other players. As player, it really helps to be excited about your character and what they can do to affect the gameworld. Session 0 should be about agreeing how to get that balance as right as possible. More options of how to create a character give more potential hooks for a player to get into the play.

So, more people playing RPGs is a good thing. If they have different expectations to the ones you prefer, communicate and encourage them to try something different.

 

[CRKrueger]

D&D's never been a humans-only game though; if we go back to the original, in terms of clearly sentient races, we have humans, dwarves, elves, cavemen, mermen, goblins, kobolds, orcs, hobgoblins, gnolls, ogres, trolls, giants, medusae, gargoyles, lycanthropes, centaurs, nixies, pixies, dryads, gnomes, treants, invisible stalkers, djinn, efreet; and there are a few others you could make arguments for, like the higher undead. If we go to the anecdotes, then remember that someone played a balrog. It's been "Mos Eisley cantina" from the beginning.


Honestly, I doubt most groups really care about creating a particularly unique fantasy world, more having enough setting that they can do some adventures in and have a decent game, because that's what they need.

That's really, REALLY reaching. There's a difference between number of sentient species and number of sentient species that hang out together and go on adventures. Half the creatures you list there would likely kill the other half on sight. Individual campaigns will always have one-offs and oddball characters

Interesting to see treating rare and unusual as rare and unusual being called "particularly unique".

 

[Psychopomp]

D&D discussion aside, I look at the thumbnail for that YouTube video, and my mind translates everything about it into, "Add an extra click to my metrics this month, PLEASE!"

 

[tenbones]

I get the sense that Waterdeep is pretty cosmopolitan with regards to demi humans.

It's cosmopolitan as it pertains to elves, dwarves, halflings, half-elves and half orcs. But depending on your edition, beyond those races it would be the exception. The extreme exception. These numbers are from Waterdeep demographics 3e

Races

Humans 64%
Dwarves 10%
Elves 10%
Halflings 5%
Half-elves 5%
Gnomes 3%
Half-orcs 2%
Others 1%


So yes, those other species exist, but by comparison when you're talking about a city with the population that fluctuates by edition from 150k to a million+, those numbers are pretty small and by definition "not the norm".

 

[TJS]

I wouldn't say that it's the lack of difficulty or death that's particularly an issue in 5e.

But I do think there's aspects of emergent playstyle (or at least some of the culture around 5e) that are issues. But these aren't exaclty new things, either - it's more that they're reemergent.

I see a lot of players that seem to want the game to play out with their characters as the protagnoist of a story and have things specifically tailored around their character and want their backstory to matter etc.

I've come to see this as problematic. We can play a game that's all about pursuing characters goals and have a session 0 in which we can work out how they intersect and then just kick off right from there - or we can play a game about exploring dungeons or wilderness and finding treasure etc, but trying to weave both things in together at the same time is just exhausting and raises expectations and workloads of GMs too high.

That's the reason I think I'm going to go back to B/X next time for D&D. I don't want any more of these carefully crafted characters.

 

[Bunch]

It's cosmopolitan as it pertains to elves, dwarves, halflings, half-elves and half orcs. But depending on your edition, beyond those races it would be the exception. The extreme exception. These numbers are from Waterdeep demographics 3e

Races

Humans 64%
Dwarves 10%
Elves 10%
Halflings 5%
Half-elves 5%
Gnomes 3%
Half-orcs 2%
Others 1%


So yes, those other species exist, but by comparison when you're talking about a city with the population that fluctuates by edition from 150k to a million+, those numbers are pretty small and by definition "not the norm".

So I'm running the 5e Waterdeep Dragon Heist. I'm going to spoiler this for anyone who might want to not see it.

Spoiler: Dragon Heist info

There are encounters that happen in broad daylight involving druegar, kobolds(disguised as kids),Bugbears, intellect devourers, kenji and a seemingly endless supply of Gazers constantly following the part day and night.

I'm not saying your wrong but the impression the module has given me is that it is a very cosmopolitan city where you would expect a little of anything to be wandering about. So the writers could be sloppy(maybe), I could be misunderstanding what I'm reading (likely), the might have retconed it to be more diverse in 5e(seems reasonable all things considered) or something else.

 

[Fenris-77]

Are you using any of the additional non-WOTC materials for Dragon Heist? There's a ton of great shit on DTRPG.

 

[Tommy Brownell]

So I'm running the 5e Waterdeep Dragon Heist. I'm going to spoiler this for anyone who might want to not see it.

Spoiler: Dragon Heist info

There are encounters that happen in broad daylight involving druegar, kobolds(disguised as kids),Bugbears, intellect devourers, kenji and a seemingly endless supply of Gazers constantly following the part day and night.

I'm not saying your wrong but the impression the module has given me is that it is a very cosmopolitan city where you would expect a little of anything to be wandering about. So the writers could be sloppy(maybe), I could be misunderstanding what I'm reading (likely), the might have retconed it to be more diverse in 5e(seems reasonable all things considered) or something else.

Worth noting that a retcon need not have taken place. There is a significant time gap in between the default Realms setting of 3e and the default Realms setting of 5e, for better or for worse.

 

[Chris Brady]

"Oh, no aarakocra in your campaign world? Well I guess I'll pass then, good luck finding other players. I'll just go play that highly niche video game that fits my needs exactly. By the way, you still on for DotA2 this weekend?"

Man, I am so happy, I never got these sorts of dicks at my table. I'm sorry but they are. I've never had a problem limiting classes and races in any of my games.

 

[Shipyard Locked]

Man, I am so happy, I never got these sorts of dicks at my table. I'm sorry but they are. I've never had a problem limiting classes and races in any of my games.

Playing devil's advocate, I don't see how he's a dick for exercising his free will in deciding what to do with his precious mortal time. I might disapprove of the level of picky entitlement the world has instilled in him, but I'm not entitled to his enthusiastic participation either.

 

[Chris Brady]

Playing devil's advocate, I don't see how he's a dick for exercising his free will in deciding what to do with his precious mortal time. I might disapprove of the level of picky entitlement the world has instilled in him, but I'm not entitled to his enthusiastic participation either.

No negotiating or asking why no flying bird people. The example, just immediately assumed it wasn't for him and shut it down. That's not how friends play. At worst, the player should be asking why not. At best, a compromise should be reached.

 

[Altheus]

The prof is entirely right in what he says. It is perfectly fine for a gm to decide what races they do or don't want in their world.

My current banned list has
Kender
Warforged
Any PC races that fly
Yuan-Ti
Tortles
Elves
Artificers
Feats

Then again, I tend to run games at a dark ages tech level rather than the late-medieval-going-on-renaissance that the published dnd campaigns us.

A large city in my world has 5000 people for instance, they don't have sewers so that is about the safe limit. Much bigger and disease runs rampant.

The presence of some of these races would lead to some major changes in the world. Flying people would lead to wires being strung from every high place for example and bars on every high window. Tieflings, actual evidence of demonic corruption would be frequently putting that charisma to work not getting lynched / drowned / beaten to death outside of any area that was majority Tiefling.

It is quite possbile that I shouldn't be using dnd to run this game, but at the moment I'm limited to things with online character generators and dnd beyond is one of the best.

 

[TJS]

Ok. I watched the video, a better video than most, although I don't agree with all of it.

I think he's right that 5e was something of a return to D&D's roots and that the game has been progessively moving away from it since. And it's questionable whether that's a good thing in the long term.

Some of what he says is kind of grognardy complaints about change - and some of it isn't really change.

Like the bit about character death. When I was a teenager there was similar angst about character death - the 2e rules were more deadly by the book but that hardly mattered when everyone was fudging behind the GM screen anyway. Twisting D&D to enact stories and wish fulfillment has always been something that has happened.

 

[TJS]

No negotiating or asking why no flying bird people. The example, just immediately assumed it wasn't for him and shut it down. That's not how friends play. At worst, the player should be asking why not. At best, a compromise should be reached.

A player who's set on playing a single specific character is generally more trouble than their worth anyway.

 

[EmperorNorton]

The thing that gets me is like... ok so what if someone wants to tell stories of wish fulfilment? Or stories where they are strong and powerful?

Like, this is a hobby for fun. It ain't that deep. If they are having fun, and their table is having fun, they are doing it right.

 

[arjunstc]

The bottomline is of course: whatever you and your group prefer

But since we are having a discussion...

I'm an old man, and have GM'd a few systems, played 2E, but 5E is my first D&D as a GM. I appreciate the simplicity of the *system*: roll a d20, add stat modifier and proficiency bonus as appropriate, apply Advantage/Disadvantage as appropriate, beat a DC. In a nutshell that's 5E.

That said, the specific rules about 'going down' and dying (or not) do clash with my sense of how damage and recovery should work. I find the idea of a PC literally dying just seconds ago suddenly jumping up from the ground and being able to use all his abilities just because of the dice a little too convenient.

Likewise the idea that you can literally nearly die a few times during a day, but 8 hours of sleep will make you good as new the next day.

Certain spells also make getting a downed PC up easy.

Of course you can house-rule these away (which I did), but the specific rules are what they are, and if you do not house-rule them, then you will get these situations in your game, which do impact how your players/PCs interact with the situations in the game world.

The assertion that "PCs don't die as easily in 5E (compared to earlier editions)" is one that is supported by the mathematics of the rules.

That's the hardware bit.

As for snowflake and pet character classes, that's more of a software or fluff issue. I've never had a problem saying "there are no [species] in the game world", or "[species] is not a playable species in this campaign", or a player not accepting that. The social contract I have with my group of players is: I make a game world with certain parameters and events/fronts going on, and you create characters who inhabit and interact with the world"; that's how I play as a player, and that's how I run as a GM - just like in the real world, I get to decide my actions, but not the outcomes.

I appreciate that a player may have a specific idea for a character that he thinks will be cool, or silly but fun - that's where the Gamma World and Space Opera campaigns come in

 

[TJS]

The thing that gets me is like... ok so what if someone wants to tell stories of wish fulfilment? Or stories where they are strong and powerful?

Like, this is a hobby for fun. It ain't that deep. If they are having fun, and their table is having fun, they are doing it right.

It's not that there's anything wrong with it if you can get what you want out of it. It's just that I'm not sure it's that easy to actually get that out of D&D - especially if you're also trying to do all the traditional D&D stuff at the same time.

I mean for all it's faults, this is the kind of the thing the Forge recognised 20 years ago and it's what inspired Ron Edwards to write Sorcerer - the realisation that traditional rpg games were kind of shit at delivering character centred stories that felt like narrative arcs ( Unless the GM really burns themselves out trying).

 

[cranebump]

The problems I have with D&D are the assumptions players bring to the table simply because content exists, they assume all that content exists in whatever setting they choose to sit down at the table and play in.

Just had a character discussion the other day with a player. We’re running Dungeon World. The bad things out there in the campaign time period they chose to play (basically, a continuation of their previous campaign, 5 [game] years later) are undead and demons. First thing I get asked —by a player who is eye-deep in 5E (the first system he actually seems to know well), is,

“Can I play a tiefling?”
“No. Demons are bad things in this campaign. If you were, the Knights of the Silver Sword would hunt you down and kill you.”

Player scans around for custom playbooks.

“Ah! I’ll be a Drider.”
“Okay, first off, the narrative verbiage there indicates bog standard Drow, and I have nothing in the game world resembling Drow. But, second, you’d be viewed as a monster and hunted down by (see above).”

We ended up reskinniing the Drider in such a way as to allow use of its abilities, without the anatomical aspects. Basically, the player has been cursed and is turning into one of these things, seeking a cure. Said curse caused him to be ostracized by his people, which means he’s separated from the one he loves.

To be fair, this player is something of a snowflake. Took a long time to nail down what we ended up with. But he (admittedly) was so 5Ecentric, he assumed the world I run is kitchen sink. Makes sense, since his current 5E groups run that way.

(NOTE: before starting character discussions, I offered 3 campaign options: same campaign world/region, continuing, but with different characters; same world, different region; or world creation, whole cloth. They picked #1. So, it wasn’t like I stomped on his assumptions arbitrarily. But, as this player is new to this campaign, his first assumption was “standard DND,” and this is what he assumed was standard. its no big deal, but I feel it does illustrate the point about what players today consider standard.

 

[arjunstc]

The thing that gets me is like... ok so what if someone wants to tell stories of wish fulfilment? Or stories where they are strong and powerful?

Like, this is a hobby for fun. It ain't that deep. If they are having fun, and their table is having fun, they are doing it right.

If that is also the expectation of the GM and the other players around the table, then yes, they are doing it right.

As a GM, I want to see my players/PCs succeed, and my job is to challenge them so they have something to overcome and triumph over. To me, victory and success only have meaning if they are earned and if failure was always a possibility. Superheroes are strong and powerful, but they are always fighting against opponents who are also strong and powerful, though usually not in the same way, and even though we the viewers of superhero movies know that in the end they will triumph, watching their setbacks, struggles, and how they overcome the challenges that make the movies fun.

 

[arjunstc]

“Can I play a tiefling?”

Lemme guess: a tiefling warlock?

 

[cranebump]

Lemme guess: a tiefling warlock?

We didn’t get that far, but...

...on the path to “Drider” the question about a pact came up. Managed to steer him away from that. .Or rather, his chargen ADD did.:-)

 

[EmperorNorton]

If that is also the expectation of the GM and the other players around the table, then yes, they are doing it right.

As a GM, I want to see my players/PCs succeed, and my job is to challenge them so they have something to overcome and triumph over. To me, victory and success only have meaning if they are earned and if failure was always a possibility. Superheroes are strong and powerful, but they are always fighting against opponents who are also strong and powerful, though usually not in the same way, and even though we the viewers of superhero movies know that in the end they will triumph, watching their setbacks, struggles, and how they overcome the challenges that make the movies fun.

You guys do know that failure and death are not synonymous right?

This is the thing that I don't get when people are like "oh if they can't die there is no challenge/consequences" crowd.

Ever have a character fail to save someone? Or have a villain get off scot-free after having done something terrible because the players couldn't get the evidence to make charges stick?

The truth is, death is IMO, the most boring form of failure, because that is the end of interesting things happening. (It's actually more interesting for the OTHER characters when a character dies. (barring resurrection shenanigans, but then again, resurrection shenanigans kind of go against the "back in my day we played D&D uphill both ways in the snow" attitude).