3 Wise DMs

Do the magic item attunement rules and limits make D&D 5E a better game or just add a layer of frustration? When we started playing 5E, we actually ignored attunement. Now, we’ve started using it across all of our campaigns to understand how the game is meant to be played. … And we have some concerns. What role do magic items play in your game? Are they rewards? Character development tools? Just items that help optimize PC builds? We’ve found that attunement, while it helps keep PC power in check, can be an obstacle to playing how we want to play. It changes PC motivations and reward mechanisms in ways that aren’t always in line with our goals. So, what should we do about it?In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave talk about attunement, magic items in older editions, and the role these tools play in their games. 1:00 What is attunement and why does it matter?5:00 A quick history of magic items’ role in D&D from Basic to 5E12:00 How attunement can get your PC killed (and make higher-level play more boring)20:00 Does attunement make treasure rewards less interesting? 29:00 How magic item limits impact PC motivations34:00 Does breaking the attunement rule make D&D 5E any worse?38:00 What role do you want magic items to play in your games?43:00 Character-defining magic items52:00 Final thoughts

Sometimes your players want something, or you want to give them something, that would be kind of lame to just leave lying around. After all, The Awesome Staff of Mega Power probably deserves its own quest to find. But how long should that quest be? And how do you keep the other players personally involved so they don’t get bored?In this episode, Thorin, Tony, and Dave talk about a fetch quest they just started in the Curse of Strahd game, how it could play out, and the risks of other players tuning out while Hawk leads them off to get his Megasword. Along the way, they talk about how they handle player requests, fitting them into your campaign, and much more.2:00 An aside about game styles6:00 Getting Hawk’s new sword and what we mean by fetch quest14:00 Giving a focus PC some spotlight time17:00 Does focusing on one player’s goal undermine the other PCs’ motivations?26:00 How much time should it take to get that fetch item?32:00 How do you bring an item or idea your player wants into the game?37:00 When is the best time to give out custom items in the PCs’ careers? 44:00 Heirloom weapon pros and cons: Items that level up with the character (include pendragon sword write up)47:00 Managing fetch quest time56:00 Final thoughts

Some players are more assertive than others, as every DM quickly learns. Some players sit quietly waiting for their turn to speak, while the “Face,” like his A-Team counterpart, never misses a chance to go to town. Before you know it, the party is down another rabbit hole or skipping through a conversation without anyone else getting a chance to participate.Or, as this week’s listener question asks: “How do you get the “Face” to STFU?To be fair, none of us actually recommends telling a player to shut up. But every group deals with some variation of this issue, and while the Face can be entertaining, none of your other players wants to play Robin to their Batman. Worse, you have other players in your group who want to contribute just as much as the Face, but they can’t get a word in edgewise. What’s a DM to do?In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave talk about how they handle the more dominant role players in their groups (especially when it’s one of them) and the tricks they use to make sure everyone gets to roleplay the way they want to.1:00 A reader question about balancing the personalities in your game that really hits home6:00 As a player: Have you made your point? Have you started repeating yourself? Then stop talking8:00 Turns matter outside of combat, too: Don’t let one player take more than a turn’s worth of actions or advance the conversation to a new topic without letting everyone have a chance to do something13:00 How our games are becoming more roleplay-focused, which can make the “Face” problem worse16:00 An example of turn-based roleplaying in our games and tricks we use to make sure everyone gets to talk and act27:00 Pros and cons of handling single-character vignettes outside of the game vs. at the table36:00 Chaos in Marvel Town: An example of a couple characters jumping the gun and pushing the whole party into a God fight (a fight Thorin swears he didn’t start…)55:00 How to rein in the Face if they’re still disrupting the game60:00 Final thoughts

Vanilla Dungeons & Dragons 5E is a fine game, but depending on the atmosphere you want to set and the possibilities of your setting, there are a lot of alternate rules that can bring your game to the next level. The D&D 5E Dungeon Masters Guide has some great optional rules you can use to bring different genres of games to life by playing up things like honor and horror. Beyond D&D itself, a lot of other games use mechanics that are worth porting in to create certain effects in your campaign world. Your own unique homebrew mechanics can be even more powerful tools for bringing your setting more to life.In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave talk about their favorite optional rules, how to use them and when. They’ll also talk about how they designed alternate combat and wrestling rules, and how the right alternate mechanics make your campaign feel more like the world you’re trying to portray. There’s a difference between making your game more immersive and just making it more complicated, and this episode will help you know when you’re on the right side of that line.1:00 An aside about U2, changing up musical rules, and the weird stuff you see at business conferences (we’re not sorry)5:00 Alternate rules and a new question from Jared8:00 Mechanic 1: Doing more with Skills and Proficiencies — and what exactly can a cleric use on a Rod of Lordly Might?20:00 From firearms to madness: A few of the alternate rules we already play with24:00 Mechanic 2: Monsters with character classes and levels like Strahd26:00 Mechanic 3: Opposed-roll parries and abusing them with 2E Bladesingers30:00 Mechanic 4: House-ruling treasure to make it less predictable32:00 Using alternate mechanics to feed the atmosphere of your campaign — like human sacrifice38:00 Mechanic 5: Slow natural healing and lingering injuries41:00 Mechanic 6: Taking weapons off simple mode and adding deeper combat mechanics47:00 Mechanic 7: Damage rules for crits, mass damage, and more55:00 Mechanic 8: Honor and reputation systems for codifying how PC’s impact the world63:00 Mechanic 9: Divine intervention and how the Ghatanothoa sentient sacrifice mechanic works67:00 Final thoughts and more mechanics we’d like to play with

Why won’t the experienced DM playing in your game back off and let you run it? A backseat DM can be a frustrating experience and force some difficult conversations — but having an experienced DM on the player side of the table to help lookup rulings and encourage the other players can also be a really beneficial asset in your game. How do you leverage that DM player as a good assistant and not let them become your worst critic?At 3 Wise DMS, we’ve played with backseat DMs, been backseat DMs, and even been backseat DMs to each other. In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave talk about how they handle the situation, how they try to leverage DM players as helpers, and how they communicate when the backseat DMing gets out of line (including when it’s one of us getting out of line). Here are 11 things you should know about handling the backseat DM in your game.2:00 2 listeners who feel undermined by experienced DMs playing in their campaigns4:00 Assistants and food critics: The benefits and pitfalls of having another seasoned DM at the table8:00 Rules vs adjudication, and times we’ve been the backseat DMs12:00 Understand the rule before you house rule — and the danger of bad calls that become precedents and problems going forward16:00 Be open to reasonable feedback and make adjustments if they have a point20:00 How DMs should act when playing in another DM’s game (especially if you taught them the game)24:00 Letting a new DM run the game their way will teach you new things about DMing34:00 How we handle backseat DMs when we’re DMing39:00 Exerting your authority to bring a backseat DM player inline44:00 Knowing the rules, making wise decisions, and ruling with consistency all reinforce your authority50:00 How to handle a DM player who wants you to step aside and kill your campaign56:00 Adjust your pacing to the frequency of play: Monthly games have to feel like the players accomplished something67:00 Final thoughts

Across the games we’re running and playing, we have several campaign worlds, NPCs, and PCs that cross over between DMs. Usually, this is no big deal, but sometimes what one DM does can unbalance what another DM is trying to do. Often this revolves around PC power, with characters in both our Marvel and Woodstock Wanderers game sometimes breaking the curve for the other DMs/GMs. But conflict can also arise over how shared NPCs and campaign worlds are portrayed. If one DM’s giant unfeeling tentacle monster is going to destroy the world, they can’t have another DM turning it into a Chibi Cthulhu familiar.How do you handle balance and communication with these shared world pieces? That’s what Thorin, Tony and Dave are digging into in this episode of 3 Wise DMs. They talk about where the conflicts arise, why they’re a problem, and how they’ve dealt with them so everyone can run the games they want but still dip into the other campaigns in a fun way.2:00 DMing PCs in shared universes with multiple DMs4:00 PC power levels in shared universes: Our Marvel Super Heroes and D&D Sword Coast campaigns8:00 Don’t be the grandparent spoiling the kids and sending them home to their “parent” DM13:00 The ol’ “Mom said no, go ask dad” DMing conundrum16:00 When Storm King’s Thunder came to Woodstock: Why a level 13 Wizard tried to wrestle an ancient green dragon … and almost won22:00 How one over-powered character can bust the encounter curve and drive up difficulty29:00 “But my character played in those games and earned those boons. They deserve to be able to use them.”31:00 Making PCs from other games NPCs in your games in a shared universe34:00 Topping out: When have you given out too much power?38:00 Where should the boundaries be for giving out magic and homebrew?46:00 How the sacrifice boons work in Woodstock Wanderers50:00 How much level and power variation is OK between characters in the same game?62:00 Dealing with differences in DM style66:00 How do you communicate and manage these issues with the other DMs?72:00 Sharing NPCs without taking them “off-brand”77:00 Final thoughts

Leveling up! It’s synonymous with D&D and one of the game’s biggest contributions to gaming culture. The very idea of gaining a level has become a staple of RPG video games, board games, and even most (but not all, as we’ll discuss) Tabletop Roleplaying Games. But is it the best way to handle character advancement in D&D 5th Edition?Dael Kingsmill of the MonarchsFactory YouTube channel has some different ideas. In a recent video, she even suggested that D&D shouldn’t use levels! Our knee-jerk reaction was to pass out the torches and pitchforks, but maybe she’s on to something. A lot of RPGs handle leveling in different ways, and we play a couple (TSR’s Marvel Super Heroes RPG and Call of Cthulhu, to name two) that don’t use leveling at all. Maybe it’s not so crazy to consider swapping levels out of D&D for the kind of open XP-buy system Dael suggests?Also, this is our first podcast recorded in-person as the guys finally get together in 3WD headquarters: Our game room. (We apologize for the extra echoes and room sounds.) Together with about two gallons of coffee, Thorin, Tony and Dave break down Dael’s suggestions and talk about how different games and older D&D editions handled leveling, player agency in PC advancement, leveling beyond 20 and more! Don’t miss it.2:00 Dael Kingsmill says D&D shouldn’t use character levels. Is that a crazy idea?4:00 Do D&D classes have 20 levels worth of good level-up stuff?8:00 Using XP as a currency to buy character powers (much like the TSR Marvel Super Heroes RPG)13:00 How to grind: Looking at how different systems handle leveling up, including past D&D editions18:00 Are levels hard for new players to understand?23:00 DM emotional blackmail and a little bit about our Christmas games25:00 Is D&D inherently a level-up game?27:00 “I got a rock” - Should we offer a way to pass up your class level ability for a feat or some other type of flexibility?34:00 What we like and don’t like about how D&D 5E handles leveling, and how you could improve it43:00 Does more flexibility make your character decisions less meaningful?51:00 Character convergence: Unlimited customization can lead to a smaller number of builds actually being played55:00 How can we add more options and player agency to leveling up?64:00 Leveling beyond level 20 and how to challenge players once they get there91:00 Final thoughts

In any TTRPG, but perhaps especially D&D 5E, the DM runs the world and the players run their characters, who are built within the rules of the game. You should let players build the characters they want to play, but that doesn’t mean you have to like it!It’s OK to have a TTRPG PC build that pisses you off. Whether it’s because they’re unkillable, unhittable, undetectable, unsurvivable, or, like our listener question this week, they passively perceive absolutely frickin’ everything! This may mean you have to change your game or not use pieces you wanted to use — like big dumb monster fights against casters with Banish. (“Which is BULL$#!7!” – DM Thorin.) But you can adjust both your own DMing and the player expectations of how their showcase abilities work in the game.In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave talk about how to handle builds that piss you off or at least challenge you as a DM. Along the way, they talk about builds, abilities and spells they’ve struggled with and how you can handle the situation without ruining the game for yourself or any of your players.2:00: Extreme passives: A listener asks how to handle a D&D 5E PC with extremely high passive perception and investigation who expects all the secrets to be revealed automatically 6:00 Respect is a 2-way street: Just like the DM wants to run the world they built, the players want to play the characters they created10:00 How we handle passive perception, use stats and dice rolls, and the problem with dice rolls16:00 Is it unfair for a player to build a character so good in one area they automatically succeed?21:00 The Observant Problem: Creating challenges and obstacles for builds that see all the secrets26:00 DMing Sherlock Holmes: How do you reign the player in but make sure they’re still having fun?32:00 Player builds and abilities that piss us off — and why Banishment is a really poorly designed spell45:00 Moon Druids, Barbarians, and dealing with ridiculous damage absorption55:00 Challenging control and stealth character builds in D&D 5E64:00 “If we’re not encouraging clever ideas at the table, then what are we doing as DMs?” Adapting your DMing style to fit the character builds at your table69:00 Final thoughts

Balance can be the trickiest thing to strike in any RPG campaign. On the one hand, the DM is running monsters and villains who are literally plotting the PC’s destruction. If their plans aren’t good or their combat abilities aren’t challenging, like DM Tony says, it’s like playing the game on baby mode. A game that’s not challenging is unrewarding. On the other, a game that gets too hard can frustrate your players right out of wanting to play it. So where is the balance? How hard is too hard for your style of game and your players?In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave go deep on what makes things hard. They talk frankly about their own troubles keeping things balanced and times their players were just about ready to turn their vorpal blades on the DM and mutiny. Along the way, we get into the difference between difficult “hard” and time-consuming “hard” (both of which can derail a game), why it’s never just about numbers, and the one thing that really tells you if your encounters have gotten too hard. 2:00 Is it too hard or too long?11:00 Managing time and difficulty for large groups (7+ players) – should there be less combat?15:00 How D&D 5E makes this harder by favoring multimonster fights 21:00 How hard is too hard? Learning from our COS Strahd fight and super-powered Santas29:00 When is a more powerful big bad hounding the players too much?36:00 Fights that’ve been too hard: When NPCs and homebrew goes wrong45:00 How players may read hard encounters56:00 When players get frustrated … and is that a reasonable way to judge your game?65:00 How much can you frustrate your players before they don’t want to play?69:00 Why the book Strahd isn’t a fun fight, even if he is technically balanced and challenging75:00 No number can tell you how hard is too hard, but your players will81:00 Final thoughts

Happy New Year! It’s a new year for new games or just continuing the ones you already love. But before we look forward to 2022, it’s important to look back at what we learned from gaming in 2021. Between playing and running about 6 different campaigns throughout the year, not to mention talking about all of it here on 3 Wise DMs, we learned a lot. From speeding up combat to the importance of good characters, especially PCs, the way we play and DM keeps evolving. In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave talk about everything they learned throughout 2021, how it’s changed the way they play, and what they’re planning for 2022.2:00 2021: A year in 3 Wise DMs gaming5:00 Tony hints at some upcoming post-level-20 house rules for D&D 5E11:00 Is it better to push characters into epic-level, beyond-20 play or start new characters? 17:00 Why don’t 5E’s published adventures support high-level play?23:00 How do you keep the tension and interest up to continue playing after you complete a book adventure?26:00 Moments we remember from gaming in 2021: Epic-powered one-shotsTeaching people who are totally new to gamingCompleting classic book modulesAlien technologyMaking new characters30:00 Cross-overs and shared DM universes 35:00 Running a totally different, combat-light, character-focused RPG in Call of Cthulhu43:00 Time management: The tension between letting players figure things out and do their own things, D&D combat, and slowing the game down50:00 Confronting the time-twisting horror of maps!54:00 Time management and large games (6 players and up … plus pets)56:00 Is D&D 5E just another big, clunky combat system?59:00 Making combat more epic and less time-consuming63:00 What did we learn in 2021?Tony’s trying to limit plot complexityDave’s trying to learn to balance Tony’s storytelling with Thorin’s improvCreating your own world vs running a book moduleThorin’s still trying to speed up sessions and combat69:00 Final thoughts and the games we’re looking forward to in 2022

What if you have your D&D campaign going, the players are having a good time … except one of them, who’s bored? Maybe they’re bored with their character or combat or the way things are going, and now figuring out a way to pick things up a notch for this player falls to you. Do you let them revamp or replace their character? Do you make combat more difficult? Making things more complicated, if the other players are having fun, is adjusting for the bored player going to ruin it for the rest of them?That’s the question Larry H. brought to us in a message to 3 Wise DMs. In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave talk about their experience with bored players, sometimes being the bored players, and the things they do to try to accommodate players who aren’t having fun in the game with their characters. They even get into some extreme character tinkering, like the Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, or “Rockwell,” a character who could wake up as any of three characters every the morning. 2:00 A listener question from Larry H.: 2 players are having fun, but one player is bored, is it OK to let them revamp their character?4:00 Who’s fault is it if the player’s bored with their character: the player or DM?10:00 Those “Oh Shit!” moments: Putting combat-optimized PCs in more challenging situations15:00 Combat shouldn’t always be the best option18:00 What makes a character interesting to play and for how long?20:00 When and how should you let players revamp their character or bring a new one to the table?25:00 How do you avoid party awkwardness when you swap out or change a PC?34:00 How far is too far? Do you allow retroactive multiclassing, for example?41:00 Red flags that could mean the change is disrupting your group45:00 More extreme ways to spice up characters and make things … more interesting56:00 Tips to make combat more challenging for a min-maxer63:00 Final thoughts

You hear The 3 Wise DMs talk about our games all the time, but what do our players really think? In this episode, we have 6 of the 7 players from Curse of Strahd on to get honest with DM Dave about what they thought of his campaign! Along the way, we get into whether you should leave your Tarokka reading random, The Death House, what it was like playing in a low-magic setting, slow leveling, the Amber Temple and much more!If you want the real scoop on how our game of Curse of Strahd went, and how we interact, this is the episode to watch. Hear not only about the adventure but about also how Thorin, Tony and Dave handle their players … and what their players think of that.2:00 Introducing the players and their characters12:00 “An experiment in self-inflicted multiple personality disorder” — remembering background and stories across multiple campaigns running at once15:00 DMing to support your players and the things they’re afraid might happen in the game24:00 Worldbuilding in Barovia by adding to the Torag mythology26:00 Party balance in combat and role play29:00 Our most memorable moments from Curse of Strahd34:00 Bringing the Universal Monsters into Barovia40:00 Saving the children in Old Bonegrinder43:00 The Blinsky void48:00 Saving Ireena entirely by accident56:00 Where’s the lore? Why the adventure only lightly tapped Strahd’s motivations and background59:00 What we didn’t love about playing Curse of Strahd64:00 The problem with slow leveling and low magic items in a monthly game68:00 Are vampires tough enough? Keeping CR levels in line with party power72:00 How DM Dave dealt with forced alignment changes and lycanthropy80:00 A few more nitpicks86:00 Should you trust the Tarokka deck to a truly random reading?90:00 Where we could have explored more and what DM Dave would do different running CoS again95:00 Final thoughts

Ding dong, Strahd is dead! He was thrown down from a pillar and we smashed his head! And with that epic victory, the 3 Wise DMs are finally able to talk about their review of D&D 5E’s Curse of Strahd, including their thoughts on what worked, why and the adjustments DM Dave made.It was a big group with 6 players, and Dave managed to connect each of them to the events in Ravenloft in some way. He talks with Thorin and Tony about how that worked, how the players and DM interacted to make the game what it was, and how he handled a group that pretty much refused to take Strahd seriously.2:00 Strahd goes DOWN! The end of DM Dave’s Curse of Strahd campaign5:00 The PCs and running a “serious” dark gothic campaign with characters who don’t take it that seriously14:00 Tarokka Deck readings and how faith in randomness worked out16:00 What brought us to Ravenloft and what DM Dave wanted to accomplish with it 18:00 Comparing 5E Curse of Strahd with previous editions of Ravenloft21:00 The final battle and Dave’s version of Lord Strahd26:00 Why Dave loved running this campaign and whether he accomplished his goals29:00 Things Dave tweaked to make Ravenloft his own35:00 How we set up the final battle in Castle Ravenloft38:00 What is Strahd doing: Why he just didn’t kill everyone and why Dave played down the Ireena story45:00 How Dave tied each player character into stories in Ravenloft54:00 Story points where the party’s decisions caught the DM by surprise58:00 One potentially triggering issue to run by players before Curse of Strahd: Violence against children62:00 Final thoughts

It’s a problem as old as roleplaying: You have a few players who are engaged, paying attention and driving the story, and other players who may be shy, or not interested in what’s going on today. The result is that half your table may not be involved in what’s going on. A few weeks ago, DM Tony posted his article with 6 Tips to Get Everyone at the Game Table More Involved. That’s the tip of the iceberg for this essential DMing topic. On the show today, Thorin, Tony and Dave will dig into what causes players to disengage, how to bring their attention back to the table, and the tricks they use to keep everyone involved in the game.2:00 Why do players check out at the table (or your online gaming platform) in the first place?6:00 Hook ‘em right off the bat: Why DM Dave starts the game by asking each PC “what’s your character doing?”10:00 Using initiative to make sure everyone gets a chance to participate even outside of combat14:00 Don’t be afraid to call on players who haven’t spoken up to tell you what they’re doing17:00 Call on everyone in every scene: Don’t assume shy/wallflower players don’t want to be more involved — they may not be seeing the opportunity, and that’s on the DM to facilitate20:00 Recognize different types of role players: Non-actor role players may not want to engage as much in speaking in-character, but often they do want to come up with creative ideas and actions23:00 The lesson of Tropic Thunder: D&D is a game of individuals, make sure each player is enjoying the game and getting to do what they want their character to do27:00 Tactical engagement: Can you run a big heist caper in your D&D game? Who leads?36:00 Tactics of engagement: Skill challenges and other tools we use to get everyone in the party involved at the same time42:00 Using character backstories to keep players engaged (and why DM Thorin is a little cautious about them)52:00 How DM Tony teased a PC’s flaw to get the other players interested in that character59:00 Tempting the party into doing more exploration and discovery64:00 Final thoughts

We’re all at the gaming table for an adventure, right? But what about when your players don’t take the bait? Maybe they’re not interested in the mysterious disappearances in town? Or you’ve built a full dungeon in “The Mysterious Cave,” but they’re not going anywhere near it? What do you do when the player characters just aren’t vibing with the adventure hooks you’ve put in the water?In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave talk about what they’ve seen undercut PC motivation, how they get it back, and motivational tricks to use at lower and higher levels in your game (because the motivation challenge is different as the tiers advance).1:00 PC inspiration: how do you motivate your players and their PCs to “DO THE THING!”3:00 Justin Alexander reopens the debate about Storm King’s Thunder character motivations6:00 Why Tony’s PCs will all take any quest9:00 Where’s the fear?11:00 Learning the truth can be a powerful motivation, but only in the right games 14:00 “I have a job to do” – Self-motivated PCs and the power of money20:00 Does your campaign have enough cool things to buy to keep the PCs motivated by money?24:00 Things PCs can spend money on as they level up27:00 Story hooks are like gifts: If you pay attention to what your players are saying and joking about, you’ll have a good idea of what adventure hooks to give them. 34:00 How Session 0 helps you tune in to individual character motivations and set expectations for group goals38:00 Don’t take motivation for granted in later levels40:00 The problem with relying on the big story to motivate your higher level players (i.e., The Red Dead Redemption 2 problem)43:00 Focus more on the story of the characters than the story of the adventures they’re in45:00 Even high-level players are often motivated by getting epic loot and powers46:00 Be ready to challenge high-level NPCs, even if they seem overpowered49:00 What it looks like when motivation gets muddled later in the game.55:00 Turning up the heat: The sublime motivation of imminent death or worse62:00 Tricks for keeping your players motivated71:00 Final thoughts

What do you need to make a town or city for your RPG campaign? A place for your PCs to hang their hats and rest their weary feet? Stores and taverns for them to unload their loot and pick up new quests? How about an economy and some way the town makes money? Who runs it and how do they keep the peace? Who tries to intervene when the party gets up to PC shenanigans? What about surprises? Is that beggar actually a shapeshifted silver dragon? Is there a secret wizard school operating out of a simple library? Are kobold tinkerers secretly keeping everything running in steam tunnels and sewers beneath the street? We have warned you not to get caught up in building towns and cities before, but this time a listener asked what needs to be in them when you have to do it. Thorin, Tony and Dave came up with 19 tips to help you do it in pretty much any RPG.2:00 A listener question: What do you need to have in your town or city when you build your own?3:00 Town Tip 1: DM Tony’s big warning: Don’t overwhelm your players with dozens of quests and NPC backstory details at once6:00 Town Tip 2: Understand how towns and cities are different8:00 Town Tip 3: Are your players going to look in every house and steal every treasure box, or are they more story-focused? That determines how much detail to put in9:00 Town Tips 4-7: The 4 things every town needs based on DM Thorin’s City of Greyhawk campaignHow does the town survive economically? (Farming? Local mines? Trading hub?)Who runs it and how do they police it? (Who tries to arrest the PCs when they cause trouble?)Shops, lodging, services and taverns (Who do the players interact with?)Secrets and surprises (A good town has layers, like an Ogre.)15:00 Town Tip 8: Kitbashing! How DM Dave turned Against the Cult of the Reptile Gods into Slavers Bay17:00 Town Tip 9: There needs to be attachment to the town, or the PCs won’t care what happens in it (or, just throw a lot of money at them)19:00 Town Tip 10: Don’t be afraid to embellish a location to make it more interesting or fantastical23:00 Town Tip 11: Not every important location needs to appear in the first few adventures — 10 Forward doesn’t appear in Star Trek TNG until the second season25:00 Town Tip 12: If you make your own town, you get to put in the things that you want to play with27:00 Town Tip 13: Know what needs to be in your town to set it up for the first adventure30:00 Town Tip 14: Don’t hand them 100 quest hooks when they come into town (although, a beggar selling a map to the secrets of the city could be fun)31:00 Town Tip 15: The town that begins your campaign start the whole story, and that’s more important than a town they’re passing through in the middle of the campaign32:00 Town Tip 16: Let the players have a hand in building out the town by expanding on the things they show investment in (and how DM Tony’s player became the caretaker of a bunch of kobolds)37:00 Town Tip 17: A town is a collection of the people in it38:00 Town Tip 18: Don’t make the town so interconnected that the players have no room to work39:00 Town Tip 19: How tough do you make the guards? It depends45:00 Final thoughts

We all started DMing RPGs a long time ago. In the case of Thorin and Tony, we held on to older editions long after new ones were released (stretching 1E material into 2E and flat refusing to move to 3E later on). But Dungeons & Dragon 5E has been around for 10 years now and is bigger than any edition has ever been in terms of sales, player base and media exposure. WotC recently announced that they’ll be releasing an update for 5E in 2024, not a replacement, and the edition itself shows no signs of slowing down. We like it quite a lot, even if there are things we miss from older editions. Now, even old-school RPG players who haven’t played a new edition in decades are wondering what they’d need to know to run 5E. Players like Jeff, who emailed us and said, “After 40-ish years, my daughter and son-in-law got me back into RPGs with 5E and I have been playing for the last 2 years or so. In all this time, I have never been a DM/GM.” And he had a few questions about running 5E that we do our best to answer in the podcast. In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave talk about how DMing 5E is different from older editions of D&D, how the culture around playing it has changed, and what every old-school D&D DM should know about running the system if they haven’t played it yet. 2:00 A reader question: What do you need to know as an older gamer getting in D&D 5E?4:00 How does 5E use ability scores and skills compared to older editions10:00 Sword & sorcery roleplaying (old-school D&D) vs. heroic roleplaying (5E)15:00 5E skills vs. 2E proficiencies18:00 D&D 2E overbearing shenanigans that you can’t use in D&D 5E (and some other shenanigans we’ve seen)25:00 Really high skill bonuses, impossible feats, and how not to be a dick DM in D&D 5E34:00 Other things old-school DMs should be prepared for in 5E: • Limited magic resistance• Hit dice used for healing during short rests• Long rests healing everything• Positive numbers are good now (a change from 2E and earlier)38:00 Is D&D 5E more cooperative with the players than earlier D&D systems?42:00 DMing in a more emotionally intelligent time45:00 Was classic D&D’s difficulty fun or good for the game? 48:00 Is it too hard to kill players in 5E?50:00 5E magic is more constrained in terms of world-altering power, but wizards are more balanced with other classes now53:00 D&D 5E spells, abilities, actions, etc., do what they say and nothing more55:00 The redeployment of alignment and “evil” in D&D 5E mechanics59:00 5E and class balance64:00 Final thoughts

It’s the scary season around our gaming tables, and that brings up one of the age-old questions about DMing: Can you reasonably expect to scare adult roleplaying gamers? Maybe, maybe not. But what you can definitely do is remove the illusion that they’re in control. Undermine that false comfort that their characters will be OK. Whether you’re threatening their hit points, sanity or character attachments, if you can shake the players’ sense of security, then you can scare them — and that’s what Halloween gaming is all about.In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave talk about the things they’ve done to try to bring some terror to their tables and times they’ve felt the fear for their own characters’ lives and worse. 1:00 Can you expect to scare adult players at the RPG table, or is this a lost cause?2:00 DM Dave’s Curse of Strahd Dinner … in full costume with a DM’s assistant playing butler and running NPCs7:00 Give the players something to be afraid of: Unbalance the threat level, attack character sanity and get them out of their comfort zones10:00 Upgrading Castle Ravenloft to make the final showdown with Strahd deadlier and scarier14:00 The PCs must be vulnerable: Why super characters undermine horror gaming17:00 It’s a long campaign: Don’t be afraid to let the players laugh and have some fun in your horror game, it just makes things scarier when the tension ratchets back up24:00 Attachments are key to RPG horror: NPC allies and friends give the players something to lose27:00 Pirates of the Caribbean is not a horror movie — atmosphere and threat build terror, not zombies, skeletons and undead pirates 29:00 Let the characters feel comfortable behind the armor and weapons they have, then introduce a threat that cannot be handled that way33:00 Horror gaming is unfair, and you need players who are willing to go with that without complaining37:00 Is a deathtrap like Tomb of Horrors really horror gaming or just a hardcore puzzle?50:00 Keep power creep on your side54:00 Some of the most horrifying games we’ve been in59:00 The one mechanic you cannot allow in your game if you want to maintain a horror vibe65:00 Final thoughts on horror gaming for Halloween

Can you teach your wife, girlfriend, best friend, family member or anyone you love to play your favorite RPG? It’s a risky proposition, as listener Dave points out in this week’s listener question: He wants to teach his wife to play D&D, and she’s agreed to give it a try, but he’s afraid that “if she doesn’t enjoy that first session, she will never come back to the table.”The thing is, we’ve all been there. Whether it’s a girlfriend, wife, best friend, brother … at some point, you want to share the games you love with the people you love, and you probably feel a lot of pressure to make them love it. The deck may even be stacked against you because these players may not come in dedicated to making it work. They may be shy, reluctant, or just less motivated to play RPGs than you are. What can you do to give them the best chance to become players?In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave talk about their experiences — both successes and failures — in bringing non-gamers into RPGs and what they’ve learned about giving them the best chance to love it.2:00 I hate myself for loving you: Why it’s a struggle to get the people you love to play the game you love10:00 Where to begin: Where are their common points of reference for an RPG experience14:00 How much should you simplify the game and explain as you play?17:00 Getting to the bottom of the kind of character they’d really like to play 19:00 Connecting with characters outside of the fantasy genre: Meet Sifa the Dazzler, a barbarian halfling based on the mom from The Goldbergs25:00 Hurdles to roleplaying and how not to scare off your would-be players28:00 Teaching roleplaying first, rules second31:00 Make character creation part of the adventure and get through one adventure that’s fun33:00 Is building characters the best place to start new players, or do you risk losing them in the weeds?38:00 Should you bother with alignment and new players?41:00 How do you keep new players from feeling embarrassed about roleplaying?47:00 What we want to accomplish in a new player’s first game 58:00 Make sure you have the right table for this new player59:00 Final thoughts and what you can learn from DMing for non-gamers

At D&D Celebration, Wizards of the Coast held a Future of D&D panel discussion with Ray Winninger, Liz Schuh, Jeremy Crawford, and Chris Perkins about new products and changes coming to D&D 5E over the next year and beyond. Among the topics discussed were changes to the way monsters will be presented, balanced, rebalanced around Mordenkainen Presents: Monsters of the Multiverse as well as some hints about how settings will be presented in the future. One of the big points of emphasis is to make the game simpler for the DM to run, especially when you’re using lots of monsters and trying to remember what they all do in the heat of battle. Are these the right changes to make? Thorin, Tony and Dave break down what we heard (or at least what we think the hints mean) and how it could impact the way we DM. Along the way we talk about monster design, PC-NPC balance, what we struggle with at the table, and changes we’d like to see to D&D 5E.1:00 Changes to monsters, stat blocks, alignment, and more2:00 Making alignments “typical”5:00 Rereleasing classic setting “guides” rather than comprehensive box sets13:00 Monsters of the Multiverse monster overhaul19:00 The war priest your players can’t play: Pros and cons of making NPCs more like monsters and less like PCs35:00 What we think of the new monster stat block layout (and a lot about dragons)48:00 Missing the Monstrous Compendium and 2E’s design philosophy54:00 Final Thoughts and some changes we’d like to see in 5E64:00 Post-script: Which edition is easier to teach, 2E or 5E?

DMing is all about bringing your ideas to the table, but some ideas reach beyond the story and dialogue to change the way the game is played. Today, 3 Wise DMs open a Pandora’s Box of DMing ideas and inspiration for D&D 5E. From campaign setting ideas to new weapon rules, combat formations, vampire and dragon age categories, and more, in this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave pitch the craziest D&D house rules and setting features they’d love to play with in the future. 1:00 Campaign ideas1. Dark Sun for 5E: Could you resurrect the survival desert setting full of slavery and cannibalism?2. Spelljammer space travel for 5E (Note: we recorded before WotC revealed it’s happening)3. Planescape for 5E: Plane shifting between different, wacky worlds and dimensions4. Call of Cthulhu in Ravenloft with PCs like Van Helsing and Jonathan Harker5. Celts vs. powerful nature spirits vs. Romans in a pseudo-historical setting with limited NPC magic6. A prehistoric game with more intense magic and active gods, but low-level technology7. Clerics vs. Wizards: A world where arcane magic has been branded heretical8. Do you need to limit PC class selection in worlds with low magic or low technology?25:00 Mechanical ideas for combat and encounters9. Technologically low and high-quality swords with non-magical +/- bonuses10. Injury rules and not recovering all your health after long rests11. Weapon wear and breakage12. An aside on Viking sword and shield usage13. Capping hit points at a lower level14. Combat formations: shield walls, pike hedges, etc.15. New weapon properties and action: long reach, weapon grapples16. Called-shot attacks (Aim for the eyes!)17. Weapons that give an AC bonus18. Improving the shield bonus, but making it something you can lose19. Heirloom weapons that get progressive bonuses/powers as the player advances in tiers62:00 Magic and magic item ideas20. Expanding spell concentration (perhaps by allowing a familiar or item to hold concentration on one of your spells)21. Creating unique spells22. Places of power where players can cast unique spells 23. Rare spell components that boost the spells cast with them24. Rebalancing charges71:00 Monster ideas25. The bag man and other Candy Man type horror monsters26. Giving dragons wider age categories and introducing mightier Great Wyrms 27. The Corpse Flower garden28. Expanding vampire power levels and roles29. Spirts of the Land82:00 Final thoughts

Patrons and punishments have been a part of D&D since 1st Edition’s paladins had to toe the line or get busted down to fighter status by an angry deity. But with so many classes drawing their powers from gods, devils and monsters in 5e — and not really getting any better deal than the wizard who studied, sorcerer who was born with it, barbarian who’s too angry to die, or the bard who just has to rock out with his glockenspiel out — how can the DM handle these patron relationships in a way that feels cool but doesn’t become unfair compared to the other classes? In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave talk about how they’ve played with patrons in past editions and how they treat them now in 5E — including mistakes they’ve made, tricks they’ve used, and the redemption stories that came about as characters tried to get back in a higher being’s good graces. 2:00 A Reader Question: How do you DM patrons that gift powers to PCs?3:00 How much control does the patron have over the character, especially when comparing older editions to what players and the game expect today?5:00 In the Name of Fun: How WotC closed the power delta that justified stripping powers from some classes for roleplay7:00 Handling patron/deity behavior violations with roleplay and adventure fodder11:00 What does the patron get from the PC’s service? 19:00 “I just want to play an infernal pact warlock; I don’t want a deal with a devil!” When players are not down with patron play24:00 Are warlock, cleric, or paladin powers worth the risk when other classes get theirs for free?31:00 What is the best way to take powers away if the character transgresses?39:00 Redemption arcs: How our Curse of Strahd characters overcame their fall in the Amber Temple43:00 The punishment has to fit the crime: How does a fallen character redeem themselves? 54:00 How do you create a patron for a character that wants to multiclass into a patronage mid-game64:00 Final thoughts

How do you bring your campaign world to life? It’s a question lots of DMs and GMs ask from a lot of different angles. We’re all looking for ways to make sure our players have fun, but also have new experiences in the game that make it feel more like characters living out a story and less like tabletop Diablo. Some of our best questions come from our listeners. That is once again the case this week as Thorin, Tony and Dave dig into three messages asking about different ways to make your RPG world a bit less hack-n-slash and a bit more immersive with interesting puzzles, rituals, and weather mechanics. 2:00 Listener question 1: Puzzles — the good, the bad, the ugly … and how we blew up Esmerelda’s wagon in Barovia4:00 Puzzles and riddles: What we try to do, not to do, and how we involve the whole party 10:00 The puzzles the party ignored in Curse of Strahd’s Wizard Tower12:00 The pros and cons of riddles 14:00 Should puzzles use character skills/talents or force players to rely on their personal knowledge?20:00 How we design puzzles: If it’s difficult for you to explain, it’s probably too difficult for your players to solve22:00 Puzzle ideas from Indiana Jones, The Fifth Element and The Lord of the Rings26:00 The encounter mix: Where and when we use traps and puzzles29:00 Listener question 2: Making rituals more immersive with tasks and skill challenges39:00 If you made the players jump through a lot of hoops to do a ritual, don’t let bad rolls ruin it42:00 It’s no fun to die (or have the story turn bad) due to bad luck47:00 Listener question 3: How do you make weather a more impactful element in the game?53:00 Ways we’ve used weather in different campaign settings, including Storm King’s Thunder, Curse of Strahd and Rime of the Frost Maiden56:00 How much game time do you want to spend (waste?) dealing with the weather?61:00 Final thoughts

No DM’s plan survives contact with the players. Between remembering the story you’re trying to tell, the details you had to improvise, and the players’ actions (which may or may not have made sense), it can be hard to keep the details straight in your RPG campaign. How can you plan out the important stuff, capture improv details before you forget them, and make sure you remember it the same way week to week? Thorin, Tony and Dave each have their own tricks for keeping their stories straight. This episode digs into those as well as handling perception when players don’t remember the game the same way you do.2:00 How do you keep your story straight as a DM?5:00 If you can’t keep your story straight, your players definitely can’t: Session prep and Google Docs9:00 The power of owing a favor … and making sure you, the DM, remember to call them in14:00 DM Thorin’s tricks to keep details straight when improving without a prep doc17:00 Control the session synopsis to influence what players remember and keep them moving forward24:00 How not to lose player interest in the details and your game27:00 DM Dave’s lasting misunderstandings in Barovia: The nagging ghost of Baby WalterUnintended Tarroka deck meaningsHandling players who latch onto the wrong details so hard that they become part of the story — even if you don’t want them to39:00 How these choices impact the tone of the game41:00 The black dragon fiasco and the kind of details DMs can’t forget49:00 How DM Tony kept Storm King’s Thunder straight with a ton of homebrew material56:00 Plot holes are just potholes: If the game’s going well, you can keep driving forward63:00 The real story lives in our heads66:00 Sometimes the DM understands their story so well that we don’t appreciate how easy it is for the players to get lost73:00 Final thoughts

When you take your RPG campaign to the high seas (or under the seas, outer space or anywhere else they need a ship to survive), all bets are off. Sure, you could run it like any land-based campaign using the ship for fast travel, but is that really what a ship-based campaign is all about? Or are they about ship-to-ship combat, unlimited freedom, and unimaginable treasure? The lure of the sea is about more than hopping from adventure to adventure. The captain is king of the vessel, whether that captain is one of your PCs or the guy enslaving them as shanghaied deckhands. So, what can you do to play up what’s different about nautical campaigns, make sure your players are happy on the high seas, and come up with cool new ideas to keep them adventuring? That’s what listener Eric asked when he sent us a note with the message “Yo, ho, a pirate’s life for me.” Here’s what Thorin, Tony and Dave think nautical gaming is all about and how they bring it to life for their players. 2:00 Ship-based campaigns we’ve run and what we did with them4:00 What elements make a ship-based campaign different from normal land-based games?10:00 A ship is freedom … or a hostage situation14:00 There has to be a reason you get on the boat — extreme freedom, extreme danger, extreme opportunities, etc. — because it would be easier to just stay on land17:00 Don’t be afraid to let the party off the boat to have land adventures19:00 An aside about loving Spelljammer22:00 What do you do if your players aren’t that into a ship-based game?24:00 The ship should be like a floating lair29:00 Terrors of the deep: What to challenge your players with in a nautical campaign40:00 Answering Eric’s question: How would we build a nautical pirate campaign from level 1? Contracts, letters of mark, and real pirate missions47:00 Nautical campaigns don’t necessarily have to be pirates, they can be explorers, traders, treasure hunters, etc.50:00 Final thoughts

Dragons are to D&D what Jerry West is to the NBA: The Logo. They’re the monsters so iconic that they’re literally part of the name. No other fantasy property has done as much or gained as much from its dragons. So, when you decide to put a dragon in your campaign, you know it has to be special. But how do you make sure it hits the right notes for your players?Fortunately, dragons are some of Thorin’s, Tony’s, and Dave’s favorite creatures. How do you make dragons feel epic? How do you make sure their hoards are the stuff of legends? Should you use really them in every campaign? In this episode, we break down everything we’ve learned about running dragons over the years and take you through how we turn them into adventures, not just encounters.2:00 Dragon archetypes from pop culture5:00 The D&D dragon colors each play differently to encompass those pop-culture types and more8:00 Dragons in D&D should be special creatures: They’re a whole adventure, not just one encounter11:00 Your dragon is hundreds or thousands of years old … What’s it done with its time?14:00 How to make your dragon feel epic21:00 How to build a dragon fight27:00 The dragon’s hoard should be as epic as the dragon fight itself39:00 Make sure you know how to use your dragon’s abilities, including legendary and lair actions41:00 How to measure your treasure to leave room for cooler stuff later48:00 Dragons and spellcasting: Do you add Wizard/Sorcerer levels to your dragons?53:00 Dragons in our other games: Curse of Strahd and the Marvel SHRPG57:00 Final thoughts63:00 PS: Should you use dragons in every campaign?

Sometimes you want to change the game up completely, even if it’s just for the night. Maybe you want to have a night of gambling games, a carnival with an archery contest, a little football, or, like DM Dave’s Barovia, a werewolf wrestling match to put the WWE to shame! When you have that urge, how do you make that happen? The 3 Wise DMs call them minigames, and in this episode, they’ll use Dave’s wrestling escapades to break down how to make these sessions fun for everyone.Thorin, Tony and Dave have talked about homebrew and crazy ideas before, but in this episode, they’re breaking down a fresh game with a look at how it came to be, how it felt to play in, and what you can take away for your own crazy minigame sessions. 1:00 Bringing WrestleMania to Barovia: How to develop a D&D session where you essentially play a different homebrew minigame3:00 5E’s wrestling isn’t interesting, so to support Hawk Morgan, DM Tony’s wrestling character, DM Dave have to invent a more cinematic wrestling system8:00 Does a Hulk Hogan clone fit in Curse of Strahd? Here’s how Dave handled it13:00 Where, when and how to pay off on a 1-on-1 wrestling match for Hawk yet still involve the rest of the party22:00 The role of humor in horror games24:00 Building the wrestling system and how it played out (see this week’s website article at 3wisedms.com for the whole system)34:00 The lumberjack match rules that let the rest of the party get involved, but not too involved44:00 The party stuck with the wrestling schtick even after they broke the rules and it went full combat49:00 Did this save a boring werewolf side quest?55:00 Advice for executing your own “minigame” sessions64:00 Final thoughts

DMs have some crazy ideas. And deep down, there’s nothing most of us want to do more than unleash those ideas on our unsuspecting players. The party is rolling along a totally normal campaign in a non-descript fantasy world, and suddenly, you’ve dropped a giant, soul-eating, boon-granting, Lovecraftian spaghetti monster into the center of it with a cult that’s depopulating the world to wake it up. Or, through your Wizard’s misfiring experimentations, you’ve bonded him to a Venom-like symbiote bodysuit. Or, SURPRISE, your wizard now has the body of a larval mage, composed of 10,000s of undead bugs! (If we’re being honest, a lot of this does seem to happen to the wizards.)These strange homebrew ideas can be the coolest and most memorable part of the campaign, but they’re also risky. Will your player throw a fit after their corporeal form is replaced with a pile of insects? The quit risk is high. The trick is knowing when, where and how to get weird and bring out the strange homebrew, and often that comes from your narrative and how the players have been engaging with it. What makes sense in the story? If you can get the players to go along with that, you can have fun with all sorts of crazy homebrew ideas.And that’s exactly what Thorin, Tony and Dave have done (repeatedly, often to each other). Here’s how they use narrative-driven homebrew to make their games unique, memorable, and more fun for everyone.2:00 A listener question: How do you decide where, what and when to homebrew?3:00 Narrative-driven homebrew: When the players and the story call for something … Strange5:00 The origins of Ghatanothoa in Woodstock Wanderers: How the big, weird god monster grew organically from solving mysteries DM Thorin’s setting created11:00 Baiting players into choosing the big character changes, from the Ring of Winters in Storm King’s Thunder to the Amber Temple Dark Gifts in Curse of Strahd14:00 Homebrewing systems: Wrestling and combat rules we’ve played with17:00 Balance and power-creep: Why we’re hesitant to homebrew classes22:00 The set-up and seduction that led to the moment DM Tony’s wizard Cassidus became a pile of undead bugs, and how the “modification” was designed for him and Erasmus’s Storm Giant Wish36:00 Campaign flavor, resistances and setting the right bar for immunity40:00 Tougher Vampires: An example of on-the-fly homebrew to fit the narrative44:00 The D&D Venom Symbiote: Another example of narrative-driven homebrew on the fly50:00 Why create a new class out of whole cloth instead of changing the flavor of an existing one?57:00 Steal smart: A lot of the best homebrew repurposes pieces from existing material61:00 What if other players want to get into these homebrew goodies, too?69:00 Final thoughts

Most DMs come to a point in their campaigns where they want to run The Big Battle. We’re not talking the players vs. a few Balors, but a real war: Storming the beaches of a fantasy Normandy, the Siege of Winterfell, the Battle of Pelennor Fields from Lord of the Rings. But when you go to set the battle up, you realize just how clunky mass combat is in D&D and most RPGs. The problem is, most RPGs are skirmish-level games, especially D&D. That means they run well with up to about 20 characters in a battle. Beyond that, things slow down and there aren’t good ways to simulate the battle. So, you wind up having to homebrew or adapt some kind of mass combat ruleset, but these don’t always work out, either. Most mass combat expansions for D&D, for example, are basically fantasy wargames, and your players may not be up for D&D night turning into Warhammer 1100 AD. A reader question inspired us to take it on: What do you do when you want your players to fight 300 zombies? In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave answer that and more as they break down what happens when DMs go to war. 1:00 A reader question: How would you handle a battle with 300 zombies?2:00 Why mass combat is and always has been clunky in D&D6:00 Mass combat is basically opposed to what any edition of D&D is designed to do9:00 3 basic ways to handle mass combat: • Skill challenge• Dynasty Warriors • War games13:00 D&D mass combat rules releases of the past (were still clunky)14:00 What makes a combat “mass”? A dozen characters? Hundreds? Thousands?17:00 5E How D&D characters change the way wars are fought19:00 Slipping on dead bodies, siege engines, Oliphaunts! How mass combat and the chaos of war should change how D&D characters are fought22:00 How do you keep running the big battle from slowing downplay for the PCs?25:00 Can you put your players in charge of an army? It depends on the party28:00 Can the enemy soldiers harm your PCs, or is it mud farmers vs. invincible knights? 30:00 How do you simulate what happens to the rest of the armies that aren’t around the PCs?34:00 An ad-hoc system for running mass combats that impacts each player and shouldn’t bog down37:00 Morale and victory conditions: Showing how PC actions impact the battle41:00 How we would handle a battle with 300 zombies: It depends on our players50:00 Final thoughts

Lots of DMs draw inspiration from their favorite movies. But adapting a movie to your game isn’t always as easy as it sounds. Can you really use D&D, where the PCs are super-powered, to create Jurassic Park, where most of the characters are lunch? How do you capture the magic of Lord of the Rings in a way your players can actually play through without following the book scene-for-scene? How do you turn linear silver screen storytelling into something that can survive an encounter with your players’ shenanigans?In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave dig into how they’d go about adopting some favorite movies into adventures or campaigns, including how it can go wrong, choosing the right system, and understanding the details your players will identify with.1:00 Listener question: How do you adapt movies into a campaign without forcing your players to recreate the movie?2:00 Think about why most video games based on movies suck, because your adaptation could suffer the same problems6:00 Campaign or adventure? Does your movie have enough material to be more than a module?9:00 Should you adapt the movie to D&D or use a system that might support it better? 13:00 Souping up dinosaurs to be Jurassic-Park-worthy threats15:00 Does a movie-inspired game have to railroad players down the movie plot scene-by-scene? (And DM Dave’s moonshot Lord of the Rings campaign idea)21:00 Why we don’t recommend creating your own game system to play out a movie (and how DM Tony tried)24:00 Is Call of Cthulhu better for doing Jurassic Park than D&D 5E?27:00 The Great Jumanji Debate: Robin Williams or The Rock version?29:00 A campaign is more than the setting: How to build the movie idea into something bigger35:00 Keeping Gandalf Cool: Should you limit character choices to fit the tone of the setting or pump up NPC abilities to match the power of your PCs? 38:00 NPCs, locations, and the feel of the movie you’re adapting42:00 Session 0 or The Big Surprise? How to introduce your movie adaptation 47:00 Final thoughts

Sometimes the best stories play out after defeat, but to get to them, bad guys need to occasionally survive the fight. It’s not always so easy to recognize when it’s time to pull back and have the monsters or villains run away or surrender to the PCs, and it can be even harder to get the party to accept the surrender after it’s offered.When should a DM surrender and how do you make sure it doesn’t turn into a slaughter? It all comes down to how you teach players to play your game. After all, if every bad guy they don’t kill comes back worse, what are you teaching them but to be murder hobos?In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave roll out their best tricks for using surrender as a storytelling tool, combat hack, and reminder that actions in their RPG worlds have consequences. Listen to learn why the greatest DM victories often come from battles your villains lost. 2:00 “Make intelligence matter again”: How and when we have NPCs surrender in our games5:00 Curse of Strahd: How the Hags escaped Old Bone Grinder to mess with the party for months7:00 A solution to slow combat: Why DM Thorin has more 5E NPCs run away than previous editions9:00 Scripted retreats: Steal a trick from Hollywood and give the party a taste of the BBEG to come12:00 When bad guys running away gets frustrating to the party15:00 If the villain surrenders and doesn’t deserve death, can they be redeemed? 19:00 The checkmate: Really good villains already have a reason the party can’t kill them21:00 Should you “punish” PC parties that don’t accept surrender?25:00 When surrenders lead to conflict in the party or the story28:00 What do you do with a party that never accepts surrender?31:00 What happens after the villain surrenders? It can be a more interesting story than killing them off42:00 DM Dave’s 3-legged stool of villainy!46:00 If your villain surrenders just to come back worse, you teach the party to never accept surrender50:00 Is the modern trope that superheroes just beget supervillains a plot-hole-ridden cliché?58:00 How to make players understand their actions will have consequences (And how DM Tony feels when his PCs can’t kill the bad guys)64:00 Final thoughts

Combat is such a central part of D&D 5E, but it’s also a part of the game that can take forever! And not all players are down for a 4-hour fight every game session. What can the DM do to keep the fights fun for everyone, even if some players in the party want fast combat and others want to take their time and enjoy the tactics? How do you make sure you’re not the one slowing combat down and killing the vibe?It’s not just a D&D question, either. DM’s who stumble running combat encounters can make even the fastest combat systems seem like a slog. In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave talk about how they run combat, from what makes a good or boring fight to how they manage their monsters, how they decide who gets attacked next, and how hard they try to kill the party. It’s everything you need to know to make your RPG combats, especially in D&D 5E, as fun as they can be.2:00 Is D&D combat unique? In any system, you need to keep it moving and know your NPC/monster abilities, so you don’t bog the fight down.6:00 What makes a combat encounter good or boring? It’s about the time invested and the context.12:00 Encounter building: How we prep our combats, whether they’re planned or improvised.16:00 An aside about our Curse of Strahd party making deals in the Amber Temple.18:00 How you manage your monsters says a lot about how you DM.24:00 Nothing kills combat faster than a DM trying to cast spells they’ve never read: Know your NPC abilities.29:00 Treasure: Random rewards or planned gifts for every party member?35:00 Too many easy fights are boring, but so is the party getting beat down every combat.38:00 What do you do after initiative is rolled?39:00 Why Call of Cthulhu combat runs much faster than D&D 5E.45:00 Balancing what different players want from combat: Some want fights to go faster, others want to take their time and enjoy tactical combat, and new players are still figuring it out.48:00 Players need to feel like they’ve accomplished something with the game, not wasted all night on one meaningless combat50:00 Understanding players’ mental ability to grasp D&D combat, their options and theater of the mind53:00 Is theater of the mind (combat without maps) a good way to make combat run faster?55:00 How aggressively should you try to kill the party?61:00 Fight about 1 in 3 encounters on the NPCs’ terms, not the party’s65:00 The monsters should know what they’re doing (h/t Keith Ammann) and fight that way70:00 DM Dave breaks Tony’s heart by saying Strahd won’t deign to wrestle Hawk Morgan 72:00 How DM Thorin decides monster tactics on the fly74:00 Sometimes the party crates opportunities for the monsters … seize them!76:00 When is it OK to run large, all-night combats, and how do you keep them from bogging down? (There may be no right decision.)92:00 Final Thoughts

Whether you’re playing a book Dungeons & Dragons campaign or just have big plans for a couple uglies in the Monster Manual, there’s a level window where your PCs will have a good, balanced encounter with those threats. But what do you do when the party isn’t in that window? Maybe through the course of their adventures, the PCs have explored everything and leveled up too fast, so now Strahd or Auril or whatever big bad is looking a little wimpy? Or maybe your players have characters they’ve been playing for a while and love, but the campaign they want to play is lower level, so it’ll need some adjustment? Either way, you may find yourself looking for ways to scale up the danger so that climactic battle still has some bite.In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave talk about how they approach these problems. Listen on to hear 3 good ways to bring underpowered villains’ power up to par, Dave’s dilemma with Strahd and the jacked level-10 party of 6, and whether or not level-adjusting modules is worth the effort in the first place.1:00 A Listener Question: How can you scale up Rime of the Frostmaiden’s Auril for higher-level play?2:00 Leveling out of the window: How do you keep your BBEG challenging for a party that’s powering up faster than expected?7:00 The 1st Way to Boost Your Villain: Leveling up their monster type10:00 “I want to play it the way it’s Done”: Why DM Dave is Reluctant to modify Strahd in Curse of Strahd or Auril in Rime of the Frostmaiden, even though the players may be higher level13:00 Be careful just increasing Villain hit points and making the fight longer, and what to do instead17:00 BBEGs like Strahd and Auril should not just get smoked — they have more stuff going on20:00 The 2nd Way to Boost Your Villain: Giving Strahd additional forces or power-ups to make sure the fight is interesting23:00 The 3rd Way to Boost Your Villain: Upgrade its raw stats and powers, but try to keep the length of the fight the same — and what’s wrong with the DMG on this?26:00 A few Final Fantasy 7 spoilers and how to use them with your villain29:00 Monster Benchmarking: Go look at things that are the kind of threat you want your villain to be35:00 Your BBEG should know the party and plan to beat them specifically. But how well should the party know them?45:00 Is it worth scaling up a pre-made adventure to fit a higher-level party, or is that wasted effort?53:00 How the unexpected makes for some of the most memorable D&D moments58:00 It depends on the room: Giving your players what they want60:00 Initial impressions of Van Richten’s Guide to Ravenloft: Did we just buy homework?63:00 Final thoughts

Dungeons & Dragons gives most DMs a good idea of how to start running high fantasy games, but where do you go from there? Or if you started with another genre of role-playing game, like horror, how do you make a high fantasy game feel alive? What mechanics, details and dungeon master tricks (or GM tricks) can you use to make your players feel what’s unique about your setting?One of the cool things about 3 Wise DMs is that we do get to play a lot of games and try a lot of genres and settings. With active campaigns that run from high fantasy to gothic horror (Curse of Strahd) to eldritch horror (Call of Cthulhu) to superhero gaming (Marvel SHRPG) — and past campaigns that covered intrigue, sci-fi and more — Thorin, Tony and Dave are always looking for ways to make their settings stand out to the players in them. Here are 13 tips we use to bring different RPG campaign worlds to life with players who’ve seen them all (and could easily start forgetting which game is which if we’re not on top of our genrebending).Note: Episode contains paid promotion.1:00 Paid Promo! Our first sponsor is Crit Academy’s Capes & Crooks: A 5E Superhero RPG. Visit the Crit Academy’s Capes & Crooks Kickstarter for more information.2:00 A listener question: How do we DM different genres and different levels of technology so they feel different from D&D.compaignworld?4:00 Respect your players’ lore tolerance and don’t over-work your details —you may be wasting your time7:00 If you spend a lot of time describing a detail, make sure it has a point, or the players might give it one (like Dave’s overly personal Curse of Strahd Tarokka Deck Reading)12:00 How DM Dave sets the tone for Curse of Strahd, or as he calls it, “D&D’s Universal Monsters”14:00 How over-the-top characters and events brought out the high fantasy in DM Tony’s Storm King’s Thunder D&D campaign17:00 What makes high fantasy feel like high fantasy? Magic item shops? Lost civilizations? The fall of Rome and Irish mythology?26:00 How do people in this setting get things done? Can the party kill every problem, or do they need to solve the mystery or save the day?28:00 Superheroes don’t kill people — how we define superhero settings33:00 Investigators can’t kill eldritch horrors — how DM Thorin brings historical reality to 1920s Call of Cthulhu and then cracks it with Mythos abominations38:00 Changing genres in response to player agency — or how we made Storm King’s Thunder a game of court intrigue40:00 Make friends and influence people: What sets intrigue games apart from classic fantasy hackfests?43:00 Not all of these games can be done with improv, you might actually have to prep46:00 Building steampunk and magicpunk worlds — science vs. magic or science via magic?58:00 Fantasy and guns: If you’re in a fantasy setting and a player wants to do some technology stuff, like be a gunslinger, should you let them?61:00 Final thoughts

From The Avengers to The Snyder Cut and Arrow to Wanda Vision, superheroes have conquered entertainment. Are you ready for them to clean up the streets of your game group, too? That’s exactly what’s been happening at the 3 Wise DMs’ game table, as our little experimentation with TSR’s Marvel Superhero RPG (MSH RPG) from 1984 has ballooned into a 3-DM shared universe. Instead of the MCU, we now have a 3WDMSHRPGU! (We really need to work on that acronym). Ever since DMs Dave and Tony were 0-level Dungeon Students, they’ve both been dying to get a superhero game up and running, and now it’s finally off the ground. But bringing a superhero world to life, managing 60 years of great backstories, and managing player characters who don’t really progress and get more powerful the way we’re used to from D&D, presents a whole new set of challenges. Not to mention, TSR’s system is not at all easy to learn by modern standards. In this episode, we’ll break down how superhero games play different from D&D and other traditional RPGs, what we do to bring them to life, and how we’ve handled the steep learning curve. Note: Episode contains paid promotion.1:00 Paid Promo! Our first sponsor is Crit Academy’s Capes & Crooks: A 5E Superhero RPG. Visit https://www.critacademy.com/capesandcrooks for more information.3:00 The Marvel Superhero RPG: Digging up TSR’s 30-year undead superhero roleplaying system5:00 Why superhero gaming? 60 years of great background material to mold into our own shared Marvel Universe (the #3WDMSHRPGU?)8:00 What sets superhero campaigns apart from D&D or other more typical RPG settings?12:00 How do you present true “superpowers” in an RPG, like throwing cars to the moon? 29:00 Capturing the fantasy of superhero roleplaying: Why lack of progress is a feature, not a bug37:00 Superheroes vs. murder hobos: A no-kill comic book power fantasy42:00 5 elements of a superhero campaign: Heroes are defined by their villainsMachinations playing out from the street to the villain’s secret lairKnow the level of the team you’re playing with and the villains they’ll be fightingLet the threat escalate around themPublic opinion matters for the heroes 51:00 How session prep for superhero games compares to D&D56:00 Cameos, cameos, cameos! Galactus, The Elders of the Universe, The Avengers, Ego the Living Planet … our superhero team has met them all and more!61:00 Can you pull DC into your Marvel? Sure! If you can manage the power gap67:00 Final thoughts

How much time should you spend prepping for individual game sessions? When should you improv and when should you plan more ahead of time? How can you keep rules lawyers and house rules under control? This episode marks one year of recording 3 Wise DMs and some of the most intensive gaming of our lives. We’ve had as many as 5 campaigns running across 3 different systems, and every week we got together to talk about them on this podcast. It’s been an intensive RPG workshop for all three of us, and we learned a ton during it. This week, we look back on the very first episode, how our DMing ideas have changed since then, and 11 things we think make us better dungeon masters than we were at the start of this podcast. 1:00 Traumatized DMs: Cringing back at our first episode7:00 Lesson 1: Stun still sucks — nothing wrecks combat like making someone skip a turn10:00 Lesson 2: Dealing with the unexpected — or how we learned to loosen up as DMs15:00 Lesson 3: Can you improv a historical mystery RPG? Why Thorin is running Call of Cthulhu by the book (and the history books)25:00 Lesson 4: What we’ve learned about session prep, dialogue and running organic worlds32:00 Lesson 5: Talking it out — how the podcast helped give us better perspective and empathy when handling DM-player conflict36:00 Lesson 6: How we cut down on rules lawyers and broken house rules47:00 Lesson 7: Homebrew magic items — creating the Vampiric Wand of Cthulhu 52:00 Lesson 8: How playing different games with different people and talking about it every week helped us handle our games better55:00 Lesson 9: Improving DM-player communication, expectations and engagement58:00 Lesson 10: We’re not there to entertain the players! … Except maybe we are65:00 Lesson 11: The formulas we use to set our games up for success69:00 Final thoughts and how our DMing changed over the first year of recording 3 Wise DMs

The 3 Wise DMs have only just started to get back together for some in-person gaming, but none of the online RPGs we’ve talked about has yet made it back to the dinner table. Can they be saved? Do the Wise DMs even want to bring them back in-person? Are the players on board? Even if everyone wants to go back to playing live, what challenges do they face?In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave talk about the surprising difficulty of bringing their games back to live, in-person play. From commuting convenience to hosting fatigue and player pushback, there are objections to overcome. But there’s a lot we all miss from in-person gaming, too. And when/if they do come back, what will they be mindful of after a year DMing from the Lab? 2:00 Do we want to bring in-person gaming back? And if so, how much?5:00 The benefits of no-commute gaming vs. the roleplaying rapport of knowing each other in-person9:00 Relieve the tension: Why players should laugh, a lot, during your horror-themed game … and then scream15:00 Will our digital tools make the transition back to in-person gaming? (Google Notes = Tony’s MVP)19:00 Is losing online battle maps a problem? Depends on the game you’re playing, your group and the size of your minis collection29:00 The many in-person minis and mapping solutions we’ve tried35:00 The Chain Golem Gang: Cool figs we never get to use39:00 Why were excited to play with minis and terrain again (in part thanks to our minis master, Scott, who also runs Paper Terrain: paperterrain.com)48:00: Can we DM historical games (like Call of Cthulhu) without quick access to Wikipedia?50:00 PC pushback: Do our players want to get back together to playing in person, ordering/cooking food, someone hosting, driving to the game around work commutes, etc.?57:00 The overlooked burden of hosting D&D62:00 The elevated expectation of DMing in person: If everyone’s going through all this trouble to come together, you better give them more than just fights and some XP70:00 Final thoughts: Do we want to bring our games back together in person? If we do, how do we do it?

It takes more than just a Wise DM to make a great roleplaying game campaign. No matter how thoroughly you plan or brilliantly you improv, the DM (or GM, judge, storyteller, or whatever the system you’re playing calls it) is only one person in a group of 2 to 10 or more people making this thing happen. When push comes to shove, the players are the ones who really make the game what it becomes — whether that’s an epic cooperative tale imaginative high adventure or a series of glorified minis skirmishes.What can players do to make a better game? It comes down to investment in the game, engagement with the world, attitude, helping bring out the best in the other players, and learning to play the game beyond your character sheet — all while not hogging the spotlight! On our website, DM Tony posted a great article on The 6 Habits of Highly Successful RPG Players, and that’s a great place to start. In this episode, The 3 Wise DMs discuss those tips and much more as Thorin, Tony and Dave delve into what makes a great RPG player (regardless of system), we want they see from the players at their tables, and what they try to do when playing for other DMs (wise or otherwise). 1:00 How “The 6 Habits of Highly Successful Players” blew up2:00 What makes a good character from the DM’s point of view?“They can take the football and run with it.” I.e., they can devise a plan and make it happenThey can get involved with their fellow players and “really make some magic work”You can be a very powerful character and still basically suck to play withA great character helps the whole party feel like they’ve accomplished something after the session5:00 Player investment in the game, not just their character9:00 Good players look for ways for their characters and the party to impact the game world — they don’t wait for (or beg) the DM to solve their problems13:00 The 3rd level of freedom: Taking the game to that place only tabletop RPGs can go16:00 How do you kill a vampire? A test for the degrees of freedom in your game20:00 Good play goes beyond your character sheet and mechanics26:00 The way the player characters talk and have fun with each other makes the game28:00 Trust you DM: Have a good attitude and know how to “Yes, and …” with everyone at the table35:00 Engage with the story as it happens and accept how the other players engage (even if your character hates it)40:00 Metagaming ruins everything we’re talking about47:00 Describe what your character is trying to do, not the roll they’re trying to make49:00 How to be an inspiring player52:00 How we build characters and what we try to do when we’re players in someone else’s game (plus: Tony’s research into Hulk Hogan)59:00 Build the coolest character that you can still stand to see change or die during the game69:00 How to build power-gaming characters that are still interesting and character-driven72:00 Final Thoughts

Dungeons & Dragons used to have cursed treasure that would suddenly cause big changes in player characters — like the Helm of Opposite Alignment and the Girdle of Opposite Gender. These were transformations that could ruin a character for some players, so we see less of that in most RPGs today, but they can still be powerful tools for the DM and players to make a narrative twist have a lasting impact on the game. Sometimes big character changes like these — changing alignment, class, subclass, race, or even gaining weird tentacle powers from an eldritch horror trying to destroy the world — can add mechanical oomph to important narrative moments. Other times, players may want their characters to change in some fundamental way to reflect what’s happening in their personal narratives. Frankly, most great campaigns see some form of big event that alters some characters forever, and that’s something you want to capture in your campaign as well. The Lord of the Rings wouldn’t be the story it is if Gandalf The Grey didn’t die and return as Gandalf The White. DMing these moments can be delicate, to say the least. If you’re driving them, you have to make sure it doesn’t ruin the character or the game for your player. If the player is pushing for them, you have to make sure it doesn’t ruin the continuity of your world or the experience for the other players. In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave break down how they handle big, character-altering changes in the game, including how to get the players on board with them, what buttons not to push, and how to make it all balance mechanically with the rest of the game. 2:00 Different ways to handle changing characters5:00 Why it’s cool to make rule-breaking changes a part of important story beats9:00 Breaking their build: When players don’t want their character to change 14:00 Are you “ruining” the character for that player?18:00 DMing the alignment price of accepting a dark gift from the Amber Temple in Curse of Strahd23:00 Back in the Day with DM Tony: Demogorgon’s Wishes in Throne of Bloodstone27:00 How big character changes that break the rules have a different impact than regular multiclassing31:00 If you’re going to push a narrative change on a PC, sweeten the pot with boons and abilities that make it worth their while to come with you35:00 When players push for big changes, should they have to give a narrative reason?45:00 How can you be sure these changes will work and not kill your game?51:00 Balancing the mechanics of big character changes57:00 Will the Curse of Strahd characters kill each other off now that some of them are turning evil?58:00 Final thoughts

Of all the roles the DM takes on, none is more important than bringing new players into the hobby. DM a game, and your player has fun for a night. Teach someone to play, and they may have fun for the rest of their lives (or think you’re a gigantic weirdo — it’s a win either way). DMing new players has its own rewards and challenges. On the one hand, they haven’t played anything before, so every goblin, dragon and rogue demigod is new and awesome! On the other hand, you have to help them learn the game mechanics, their character mechanics, and how to engage with a wide-open RPG world. It’s a lot of fun but requires some extra thought to onboard the new player and make sure they have as much fun as possible. In this episode, on the eve of DM Dave launching a mostly rookie campaign, the 3 Wise DMs talk about how they handle new players, what they do to try to teach them the game, and how they make it fun without overwhelming the poor newbs. 1:00 Dave’s new game for Bonnie’s girlfriends, all newbs, running Rime of the Frost Maiden … 4:00 Remembering 0-level antics and Necros: The Dragon Magazine school of evil wizardry 8:00 Tip 1: Where do you start? Do you teach the rules first or let them build a character they’ll love?14:00 Tip 2: Why we hate teaching the game with pre-gen characters (well … mostly)19:00 Tip 3: The joy of DMing players who haven’t seen any RPG tropes before21:00 Tip 4: Guiding new players into the right characters for them23:00 Tip 5: Letting the player create characters together instead of a bunch of secret randos26:00 Tip 6: How we try to get new players out of their shells and into the roleplaying29:00 Tip 7: Should you start your new players in a big town to explore or lead them right into a dungeon?34:00 Tip 8: How self-directed are your players? Getting a feel for how they’re going to react to the world39:00 Tip 9: What do you do beyond session 0 to session 1, 2 and onward? When do you put the real long-haul campaign together?44:00 Tip 10: “The protagonist is directly messing with you!” What to do when the party doesn’t know what it wants to do47:00 Tip 11: Make sure the new players have good characters who want to be adventurers (ideally heroes)52:00 Tip 12: Teaching the game mechanics: Should you start with combat?57:00 Tip 13: Teaching new players their place in the world60:00 Tip 14: How do you help new players learn their characters better?66:00 Final thoughts

It’s the Big Bad Evil Guy (BBEG)! The font from which all the pain in your campaign should spring. … So, how do you make sure that NPC is epic and inspires your PCs to true desperation like Darth Vader and not a sniveling mama’s boy like Joss Whedon’s Steppenwolf? It can be a fine line to walk. You need to make the villain powerful, intimidating, and willing to do things that the players will hate. But you can’t make them so bad that the players will come to hate your game. There are levels to this, and finding just the right level for your players is part of the magic hidden in every great RPG campaign. In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave dig into how they create villains, from concept to motivation to final confrontation. Along the way, they talk about what makes a good evil and how to trigger their players and characters just enough to motivate them to put a stop to it.2:00 What are you trying to achieve with your villains?5:00 5 reasons your big bad doesn’t just kill the party (or why Strahd didn’t wipe us out at lvl 3)13:00 Hiding in the shadows: When should you reveal your BBEG?18:00 DMG tools for changing up your campaign style22:00 What kind of villain do you want to run? Power broker? Archmage? Giant immortal dragon? Unspeakable tentacle monster? Kaiju-sized flying bear? Motivated tax collector?26:00 DM Dave’s Triangle of Evil: Monster – Villain – Amorphous Organized Enemies34:00 Anticlimaxes: What do you not want to have happen to your villain?38:00 Making Strahd Scry: Ways to give your villain an advantage over the party42:00 A boss battle needs mortal tension, but how much tension is right for your players?47:00 How long should your boss fight last?49:00 Preparing your villain for the final showdown: What special measures (cheats?) are OK? 56:00 Adding levels and minions to keep the villain powered up with the party59:00 The players need to know they beat something worth defeating67:00 Character motivations: Creating an enemy that pushes the buttons these characters care about 72:00 What the BBEG can’t do: No sexual assault, no “women in refrigerators,” no acts so dastardly they ruin the game for the players.76:00 Final thoughts and a 5-step plan for creating great RPG villains

“Alignment doesn’t matter!” We’ve heard it all over the place, but alignment has been a part of D&D — and most RPGs in some form — for decades. And it’s been played differently through every edition. Is it worth your time? Does it make things worse instead of better? Does it have any benefits players today are overlooking?Once upon a time, violating alignment could cost a character a level, which meant acting against alignment lead to fighters forgetting how to swing a sword as well. It got kind of weird, and many modern RPGs, including D&D 5E, have de-emphasized alignment since then in the name of player fun. But in other ways, the 9-box D&D alignment grid can be a very useful roleplaying tool. And doesn’t it make sense for Paladins and Clerics to lose some kind of power when not acting within the tenets of their deities? In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave talk about what they really think about alignment in TTRPGs, including how they use it in their games to define characters but not controlling them.2:00 A brief history of D&D alignment and what we think about the iconic 9-box, law/chaos X good/evil system 7:00 Who decides what these alignments even mean DM, player, other players?9:00 Should alignments be relative to the world or the character’s internal POV?12:00 Would the 3 Wise DMs (and most modern people) be Lawful Good?13:00 Alignment is more useful for defining how a character feels about the world or culture than defining the world or culture15:00 How lawful, neutral and chaotic characters feel about the rules and society18:00 The DM Trap: Don’t get caught up in “enforcing” PC alignment21:00 How mechanics interact with good and evil in D&D 5E24:00 How do you define “good” and “evil” in a D&D campaign?27:00 Captain America and making decisions by prioritizing one side of alignment over the other30:00 “How is this OK from your character’s POV?” An approach to DMing player character alignments (and the Deck of Many Things Debacle)38:00 D&D’s 5E power balancing and how it impacts play41:00 Cons and pros (but mostly cons) of Paladins needing to be Lawful Good in old school D&D47:00 Don’t be a line judge, but do get player buy-in on how alignment, gods and patrons work50:00 Why alignment should matter53:00 9 stories about burning a village down: The alignments in action 58:00 Alignment subjectivity vs. character decisions and problem-solving63:00 Beyond alignment: Things more important to characters than their alignment68:00 Alignment and god-like tentacle monsters73:00 Use alignment as a hook, just don’t force it76:00 Ultimately, it doesn’t matter what alignment the DM thinks an action is because the PC’s point of view should define it82:00 Final thoughts90:00 “Alignment isn’t important” — Myth busted, plausible or true?

For the first time ever, we brought the whole team together to recap DM Tony’s very highly customized version of Storm King’s Thunder. Hear what all 5 players and Tony thought of the game and what they have to say about the CRAZY MAGIC ITEMS in it, his changes to the campaign, fitting in their backstories, and more! Along the way, we talk about fighting the Kraken, befriending (most) of the giants, and how we all became The Avengers in a Halloween game. If you’re wondering just how far a DM can push a book module beyond what’s written before your players balk, this is the episode for you. You’ll hear how Tony pulled off his tricks, how the players reacted to them, and the secret backstories and DM canon we never got to see. 1:00 Introducing the players3:00 A high-magic party for a high-magic campaign4:00 Jacob: The middle-aged police detective turned dad-rage barbarian with his dead wife playing ancestral spirit.7:00 RO4M: The “repurposed” Warforged warlock with a random personality track9:00 Wilhelmina Draughall: The Sorcerer-Warlock dedicated to convincing the Raven Queen to save her brother’s life. And her pet alcoholic imp, Morningstar10:00 Roderick R.R. Draughall: The dying nobleman based on Vincent Price from The Fall of the House of Usher14:00 The Draughall’s secret backstory and how the big campaign plots battled with personal storylines for airtime21:00 Playing Zhang Fei: A lawful neutral samurai bugbear raised up from a slaughtered goblin warren by his cruel Daimyo25:00 Enter Erasmus the half-giant DMPC replacement wizard34:00 How Tony worked PC backstories into the wider SKT plot, one plot twist a player vetoed, and one we never got to 37:00 The 3 Guardians of DM Tony’s SKT: Zephyros, Elios and Traxton the Troll King (Hint: two of those aren’t in the book)41:00 DMing a party that talks its way out of half the encounters45:00 What you gain and lose when the players don’t share their backstories with the party – and the stolen Wish!49:00 Jacob’s secret backstory (and Erasmus’s)53:00 How much of Tony’s story and headcanon did the players actually catch?58:00 Bryn Shandar: Where the party started making friends and influencing giants64:00 Our favorite moments from the campaignGoing ham on the Hill GiantsRacing the Frost Giant demigod Tagrim’s dragon-drawn Spelljammer longship for The Ring of Eternal Winters Recovering Jacob’s memories (which included the murder of the Queen)Wielding the fulling empowered Hammer of Thunderbolts71:00 The Weapons of Legend!81:00 Other items, boons and buffs DM Tony showered upon the party86:00 Why DM Tony doesn’t think jacked attribute numbers matter87:00 Running the Kraken fight against 11th level characters90:00 Final thoughts and the Avenger we each became in the Halloween game

When is a book module not a book module? When the DM throws in birthday games, a modifiable Spelljammer airship, legendary weapons tied to every character’s backstory, and more deviations from the standard campaign than we could count. That’s how DM Tony made Storm King’s Thunder his own. We just wrapped this epic campaign at level 11 after 16 sessions. Now the 3 Wise DMs are comparing notes on the episodic, exploration-lite, story-focused approach Tony took with it, how that felt to play in, and what you can learn about making Wizards of the Coast published campaigns fit your table and DMing style. Click the episode to hear all this and more, as we break down the 9 main deviations Tony brought to Storm King’s Thunder and the DM’s perspective on running it. Then come back for our next episode, when we bring in Tony’s players and hear what they thought of his approach to DMing the game and their characters.2:00 Wrapping up our first 3 Wise DMs campaign: DM Tony’s Storm King’s Thunder4:00 How we did it: 11 levels in 16 game sessions, and how that compares to our other campaigns7:00 The two Erasmuses10:00 From book to tabletop: Getting Storm King’s Thunder ready to play 12:00 The 1st Deviation: Why the party meet-up matters, and how Tony got the party working together17:00 High magic and The 2nd Deviation: Zephyros’s Guide to Turning Your Party Into Tactical Brilliance 20:00 The 3rd Deviation: Putting in boons and items that boost PC’s lower stats is “harmless”22:00 Dealing with intraparty jealously and making sure the PCs are on par with each other28:00 What did Tony keep from the original campaign? 70%! Really! Only about 30% Changed! 30:00 Get on the Highwind! Why we did SKT as a whirlwind tour instead of meandering exploration33:00 The 4th Deviation: Zeus’s Lightning Bolt and Mjolnir? Every character gets a legendary artifact weapon! … You just have to take it off a giant chief35:00 An EPCOT World Showcase Forgotten Realms experience41:00 The 5th Deviation: Opting out of the build-it-yourself side quests to off-book places like Waterdeep (and getting up to 35%, 40% changed! Honest! Only 40%!)45:00 Worthy side quest motivations? “Go save the world! But first, go to that city 500 miles away to tell this courier’s widow that he’s dead.” 49:00 Tony’s formula for creating legendary, character-specific magic items. 56:00 The Curse of the Draughalls58:00 A chapter-by-chapter rundown of our run through Storm King’s Thunder59:00 The 6th Deviation: Nightstone and the early quests we skipped to do Dave’s birthday right67:00 The 7th Deviation: King Traxton’s Mountain and DM Tony’s take on the airship (which was promoted from blimp to a Spelljammer ship that let the party race a Storm Giant Demigod for the Ring of Winters)69:00 The 8th Deviation: Skipping the exploration and jetting off on DM Tony’s Celebration of Gaming73:00 The All-Father’s Path, fighting every kind of giant in one encounter, and The 9th Deviation: visiting Elios’s Sky Mall (50% It was only 50% different! Honest!)78:00 Prep for DMing like you’re giving a presentation82:00 Final thoughts

Do your players feel into the campaign setting you’re running, or is it just generic D&D world #124 to them? What can you do to bring that world more to life and make it feel unique to you and your players? What makes a D&D session feel like more than just a glorified board game?With about a half dozen campaigns running between the 3 of us, making each of those worlds and settings feel unique is important (especially with Strahd running around in two of them). Over the years, we’ve built up a bunch of description techniques, mechanics and tricks to try to give our settings just the right amount of detail to feel alive without overwhelming the players with architectural dissertations. Here are 37 of the tricks the 3 Wise DMs use to try to make the players feel immersed in our worlds and give the settings some soul. If you can think of any to add, leave a comment or write us at [email protected]:00 Do the Drow have clown schools? — Setting ideas that … appeal to us5:00 Why it’s important to make players feel the tone of a setting6:00 Trick 1: Keep your descriptions brief but memorable — pick one detail you want to make sure the players remember9:00 Trick 2: What does this look like in the game? Think about how players will interact and the why behind what things look and act like12:00 Trick 3: What am I playing? High fantasy needs different descriptions and details than horror or other types of games14:00 Trick 4: Deep logic: Why pull historical details into a high-fantasy game where you could do “whatever you want” (and why what you make up may feel less fantastical than the historical detail)16:00 Trick 5: Using “generic” fantasy tropes to set up unique twists and subversions18:00 Trick 6: Don’t introduce things you won’t be able to give the attention they need (i.e., why Beta Ray Bill didn’t make it into The Avengers movies)20:00 Trick 7: Start your description small and let the players ask for the details they care about22:00 Trick 8: Curse of Strahd’s Baby Walter Returns! Don’t be afraid to steal plot ideas the players throw out that you didn’t think of — use them to hook that player26:00 Trick 9: From Spartacus to Plato’s Utopia: Steal smart and without shame29:00 Trick 10: Be careful not to design so much you can’t run it effectively30:00 Trick 11: Do spend time building the unique, cool things that players will interact with often32:00 Trick 12: Why highly magical campaigns where you fly/teleport/space travel often leave players feeling disconnected from the day-to-day worlds their characters are in35:00 Trick 13: The timing of your sessions should impact your level of detail — monthly games don’t have room or attention for details like a weekly game39:00 Trick 14: You can’t horny bard your way through Barovia — showing the players what works and what doesn’t in your campaign setting42:00 Trick 15: How to teach D&D players to be afraid in a Call of Cthulhu game49:00 Trick 16: If your setting is in our world or historic, search online for real photos and records to show it50:00 Trick 17: How and when to use an unkillable monster to teach the players to run away53:00 Trick 18: Like they noted in the original Ravenloft module, horror is tough to convey when everyone is sitting around eating chips55:00 Trick 19: Skill check difficulty is its own kind of horror56:00 Trick 20: Know when a too-easy fight could ruin the adventure58:00 Trick 21: Limiting technology (or turning it to evil) can enhance horror60:00 Trick 22: How secrets and PC insignificance make Call of Cthulhu feel different63:00 Trick 23: Modern settings require the highest suspension of disbelief — unless you take them off-world64:00 Trick 24: Why most Marvel RPGs are set in the ‘80s, even when they’re in the “present-day”65:00 Trick 25: Establish your difficulty level at the start of the campaign. What level qualifies as “high level” in this world?66:00 Trick 26: How to pace and benchmark level in your world68:00 Trick 27: Slave collars: The new player railroad! (Make sure you discuss the situation beforehand and everyone wants to play in it)70:00 Trick 28: Reskin spells to look different in places like Barovia72:00 Trick 29: Understand that the dice can roll for the players or against the players at any time74:00 Trick 30: How available is magic in the world and what does it look like? If a player wants to get a magic item, do they need to go home and buy it, or go out in the wilderness and find it?77:00 Trick 31: You decide what’s going to be important to the players: Are you making them count rations? Ammunition? Does money even matter to PCs in your world?78:00 Trick 32: Counting sanity and honor dramatically change the tone of a setting80:00 Trick 33: What kind of benchmarks are you showing the players so they can see where they stand?81:00 Trick 34: Involved item lists make players love shopping82:00 Trick 35: Use skill challenges to reinforce the environment and break up the action83:00 Trick 36: Death Curse85:00 Trick

Party balance: It’s the most important thing every new campaign needs, right? Maybe not. Is there anything a party really NEEDS to have? Can your players survive without a healer? Or a thief? Or a meat shield warrior? Will they still have a good time?In general, we’re big fans of letting each player play whatever they want to play and working out party balance as we go. But what do you do when that leads to overlap and obvious weak spots? Is party balance as important as some players make it out to be?In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave take a deep dive into what party balance and imbalance do to the game, what it means to the DM, and what it means to the players — some of whom might not be entirely copacetic about playing in a game where the party isn’t balanced the way they want it to be. 2:00 Do we, as DMs, care whether the party is balanced or not?5:00 Cool things DMs can do with unbalanced parties10:00 Ways an unbalanced party limits what the DMs can do 13:00 Even if you don’t care about party balance, the players might15:00 Hired Goons! Wizards are executives, so the all-wizard party should hire meat shields17:00 How to use subclasses in D&D 5E to make sure PCs of the same class still feel different. IE: The 4 Wizards are an Evoker, a Conjurer, a Diviner, and a Blade Singer23:00 What you gain when the PCs do have a balanced party29:00 Players tend to care that the party is balanced and handle that themselves35:00 What to do when a player is worried about party balance and won’t just go with the PCs everyone has brought39:00 Exploiting weaknesses against high-stat PCs43:00 Does the importance of party balance change with different systems? (and why it never really matters to the DM)51:00 The real problem with an unbalanced party? Players don’t like other PCs stepping on their toes? (and why whatever the PCs can or cannot do, at the end of the day, it’s the DM’s problem)58:00 How do you help the players accept the party’s overlap and deficiencies?63:00 Final thoughts: Myth confirmed, busted or inconclusive?

The biggest variable in any TTRPG campaign isn’t the dice, the monsters, or even the unbalanced psyche of an exasperated DM. It’s the players themselves and the party dynamic they create both in the game with their characters and around the table as the people they are. How do you want the party in your campaign to work? Are you OK with a little role/skill overlap? Are the players? How well do the players themselves need to get along? Are you approaching the game as a bunch of friends hanging out, or as people with a shared hobby just coming together to do the thing and may not have to get along great to make a great campaign?In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave talk about what they want in the parties they’re playing with, what they care about, and what they let slide. Along the way, they discuss some of their trickier party dynamics challenges, and how they try to keep the games fun for everyone playing.2:00 What we want to see in our PC parties7:00 Character class/role/skill overlap and a listener who’s feeling squeezed out14:00 Some tricks we use to deal with skill overlap22:00 How the numbers work themselves out at higher levels26:00 Should you intervene to prevent overlapping characters as the DM or let the players work it out?32:00 How mechanics have been spread around D&D 5E classes to help with unbalanced parties37:00 Party roles we enjoy and hate playing44:00 Can’t we all just get along? Handling player personality dynamics48:00 Intra-party conflict: When the party fights each other (and a digression into the D&D fiction we have and haven’t read)52:00 What we want players to do to help bring the party together59:00 How do you reign in a player who’s hogging the spotlight without squashing their enthusiasm?66:00 Should you push wallflower players into the spotlight?73:00 Final Thoughts: Is the way we think we’re playing the way the other players experience us?

The ultimate BBEG for any tabletop RPG is the calendar. And judging by the vast gallery of memes about this topic, that villain is nigh unbeatable. Whether our schedules are hard to align or players have important things that come up or someone in your group is just flakey, every DM has to deal with some level of absenteeism. It’s always a little bit disruptive, and sometimes it can outright kill your campaign … How do you handle it? We all deal with this. Every game Thorin, Tony and Dave run sees players occasionally have to miss a session. We deal with it in a variety of ways, from rescheduling to running without them (there’s a ranger in The Woodstock Wanderers who hasn’t been seen since she ran off to “study dinosaurs”). Although no one likes having players miss a game, we have ways we approach the issue and keep things moving along. In this episode, we reveal all our best advice for overcoming attendance and scheduling conflicts, including our one killer tip for getting players to commit to the next session. 2:00 A gaming club with a problem: How do players missing games impact your campaign?10:00 Should there be a penalty for missing games? Do they still get XP? Treasure? Magic items?17:00 The politics of players missing games – are the other players OK with it?19:00 Information management: How do you keep a player engaged in the story and lore if they’re missing half the content?26:00 Flexibility and FOMO: Different ways to approach players missing games32:00 The Cannon Ball Run Gambit35:00 Adjusting your game for lower session frequency39:00 And now for something completely different: Try a new campaign or game with the players you have43:00 Are you playing too often? Adjusting frequency and session length for the players you have48:00 Why you should keep the tone lighter if players are missing or you’re playing less frequently52:00 TTRPG scheduling tips: Our one big tip for getting the group to commit to the next session57:00 Final thoughts

One of the old, unwritten rules of most TTRPGs is “Never Split the Party!” We tease our players with the risks and watch things go haywire when they don’t listen. But is splitting the party actually so bad? Can you play “Character Karaoke” and make sure everyone still has fun?In truth, though, we usually try not to split the party up as DMs. After all, that just means you’re now trying to juggle 2 or more stories instead of the one you came to tell. But we’ve had a few split-party incidents lately that turned out to be a lot of fun! Is this old saw just a myth? In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave play MythBusters: They dig into their experiences with splitting the party and break down what you gain and lose by introducing this trick to your game. 2:00 Why splitting the party in an RPG doesn’t work the same as a book or movie7:00 When scouting gets out of hand: The druid works alone10:00 A few ways to handle solo scouting and fly-away familiars without eating up too much game time and spotlight20:00 The usual suspects: Breaking PCs out into individual dialogue with NPCs (like the Arkham police)28:00 Is everyone at the table having fun when they split up?31:00 Shopping during game-time: Better in some systems than others34:00 How to balance individual character spotlights and the rest of the party waiting43:00 How far should you let the player’s interpretation of NPCs and events influence what you planned?47:00 What makes the party split themselves?56:00 Character impulsiveness: Good role play or impatient players?59:00 Tips for DMing split-up parties63:00 When do you bring the party back together?66:00 How do you handle table-talk and party knowledge when the characters split up?69:00 Secrets and lies: How do you handle intraparty secrets and hidden backstories?74:00 Who is Finneas, anyway?79:00 Partial-party side quests: Do you do them? How do you handle treasure, XP and … Death?87:00 Final thoughts: Myth busted, confirmed of inconclusive?

Every campaign gets to level 1, but how many make it to level 20? How do you challenge players who wield actual cosmic power? Is it fun to be kings, queens, warlords and arch-mages — and take on the responsibilities that may come with those titles? How does the DM/GM make epic-level enemies feel challenging and satisfying to defeat? How do you bring it all to a satisfying end?There’s a time for fighting rats, goblins and thugs … And that time is long gone. High-level play, in any TTRPG, should feel different. It’s not just about bumping up stats — you have to make the game FEEL epic. It’s time to pay-off on the plot threads the PCs have been pulling since level 1 and let the players see the impact their characters have had on the world.In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave reveal their best tips for high-level campaigns, including what they do with “Hall of Fame” characters and how to bring it all to the kind of climax your players and friends will talk about for years.2:00 Our experiences with long campaigns6:00 When is a campaign “High Level”? 11:00 High-level play should pay off on the relationships and events built throughout lower-level play18:00 The PC’s story arcs should still be alive heading into the epic tier 23:00 Who really wants to be king? What does REAL POWER look like in a TTRPG setting?32:00 How do you bring a high-level campaign to a satisfying conclusion? Pay off on the character’s goals40:00 What do high-level campaigns look like? How are they different?46:00 What we want in epic-level villains and monsters52:00 How we handle thugs, bandits and run-of-the-mill/random encounters for high-level PCs60:00 “Welcome to the Hall of Fame”: How to bring an epic campaign to a satisfying conclusion64:00 Do the things video games can’t: Reshape the world in the characters’ (and players’) image65:00 Going out with a bang: How to nail that last session·        Bring out that BIG monster you’ve been saving all campaign·        Try not to TPK them (heroic death can be good, failure is usually bad)·        Pay off on expectations – don’t subvert them·        Give them a BIG fight·        Don’t wait until the final fight to give them the legendary gear·        Finish it in one session— you don’t want to cut in the middle of the final battle68:00 Final thoughts