Dungeon Master and Dimension 20 host Brennan Lee Mulligan visits WIRED to answer the internet's burning questions about Dungeons & Dragons. What are Brennan's tips for first time DMs? How do you make compelling characters? What does someone need to get started playing Dungeons & Dragons? What's the most accurate representation of DnD in pop culture? Answers to these questions and many more await on Dungeons & Dragons Support.
SPECIAL THANKS TO BEX SCHWARTZ and The Montauk CLUB D&D Club
0:00 DnD Support
0:15 Most iconic monster
1:04 A great DnD character design tip
1:54 Friendship
2:54 Getting started with DnD
5:03 The best representation of DnD in pop culture?
6:23 Practicing your girl voice
7:20 How DnD alignments work
8:36 Paladins, Warlocks, and Sugar Daddies
9:21 Squish squish
9:51 I think he has dice but he’s afraid to show them to anyone
12:49 Fudging
14:04 The DnD golden rule
14:37 Favorite DnD character race and class combo
15:46 How do you handle a tpk?
17:05 But first, the tavern.
17:40 First time dungeon master tips
19:09 Critical roll vs Nat 20
20:05 When the dice won’t commit to the bit
21:02 Favorite spell
21:27 Can I play with you guys
22:34 Visiting another person’s campaign
24:30 Favorite magical item
25:09 You know what grinds my gears
26:11 Niche lore
26:59 If anything it’s the opposite
27:40 How much prep?
28:51 How many different editions
29:51 New rules?
30:42 Yee…haw?
31:32 Dungeons and Drag Queens? I’m in.
32:18 What does a Mimic look like when it's not mimicking?
Director: Lisandro Perez-Rey
Director of Photography: Kevin Dynia
Editor: Richard Trammell
Expert: Brennan Lee Mulligan
Line Producer: Joseph Buscemi
Associate Producer: Paul Gulyas; Brandon White
Production Manager: Peter Brunette
Production Coordinator: Rhyan Lark
Talent Booker: Mica Medoff
Camera Operator: Christopher Eustache
Sound Mixer: Sean Paulsen
Production Assistant: Ryan Coppola
Groomer: Denise Renee Valentine
Post Production Supervisor: Christian Olguin
Post Production Coordinator: Rachel Kim
Supervising Editor: Rob Lombardi
Additional Editor: Jason Malizia
Assistant Editor: Billy Ward
Still haven’t subscribed to WIRED on YouTube? ►► http://wrd.cm/15fP7B7
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ABOUT WIRED
WIRED is where tomorrow is realized. Through thought-provoking stories and videos, WIRED explores the future of business, innovation, an
SPECIAL THANKS TO BEX SCHWARTZ and The Montauk CLUB D&D Club
0:00 DnD Support
0:15 Most iconic monster
1:04 A great DnD character design tip
1:54 Friendship
2:54 Getting started with DnD
5:03 The best representation of DnD in pop culture?
6:23 Practicing your girl voice
7:20 How DnD alignments work
8:36 Paladins, Warlocks, and Sugar Daddies
9:21 Squish squish
9:51 I think he has dice but he’s afraid to show them to anyone
12:49 Fudging
14:04 The DnD golden rule
14:37 Favorite DnD character race and class combo
15:46 How do you handle a tpk?
17:05 But first, the tavern.
17:40 First time dungeon master tips
19:09 Critical roll vs Nat 20
20:05 When the dice won’t commit to the bit
21:02 Favorite spell
21:27 Can I play with you guys
22:34 Visiting another person’s campaign
24:30 Favorite magical item
25:09 You know what grinds my gears
26:11 Niche lore
26:59 If anything it’s the opposite
27:40 How much prep?
28:51 How many different editions
29:51 New rules?
30:42 Yee…haw?
31:32 Dungeons and Drag Queens? I’m in.
32:18 What does a Mimic look like when it's not mimicking?
Director: Lisandro Perez-Rey
Director of Photography: Kevin Dynia
Editor: Richard Trammell
Expert: Brennan Lee Mulligan
Line Producer: Joseph Buscemi
Associate Producer: Paul Gulyas; Brandon White
Production Manager: Peter Brunette
Production Coordinator: Rhyan Lark
Talent Booker: Mica Medoff
Camera Operator: Christopher Eustache
Sound Mixer: Sean Paulsen
Production Assistant: Ryan Coppola
Groomer: Denise Renee Valentine
Post Production Supervisor: Christian Olguin
Post Production Coordinator: Rachel Kim
Supervising Editor: Rob Lombardi
Additional Editor: Jason Malizia
Assistant Editor: Billy Ward
Still haven’t subscribed to WIRED on YouTube? ►► http://wrd.cm/15fP7B7
Listen to the Get WIRED podcast ►► https://link.chtbl.com/wired-ytc-desc
Want more WIRED? Get the magazine ►► https://subscribe.wired.com/subscribe/splits/wired/WIR_YouTube?source=EDT_WIR_YouTube_0_Video_Description_ZZ
Follow WIRED:
Instagram ►►https://instagram.com/wired
Twitter ►►http://www.twitter.com/wired
Facebook ►►https://www.facebook.com/wired
Tik Tok ►►https://www.tiktok.com/@wired
Get more incredible stories on science and tech with our daily newsletter: https://wrd.cm/DailyYT
Also, check out the free WIRED channel on Roku, Apple TV, Amazon Fire TV, and Android TV.
ABOUT WIRED
WIRED is where tomorrow is realized. Through thought-provoking stories and videos, WIRED explores the future of business, innovation, an
Category
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FunTranscript
00:00I'm Dungeon Master Brennan Lee Mulligan,
00:01here to answer your questions from the internet.
00:03This is Dungeons & Dragons Support.
00:10Okay, first question.
00:12Obama Prism VHS, the most iconic,
00:15parenthesis, famous D&D monster.
00:17You gotta love a mimic.
00:18A monster disguised as a treasure chest.
00:21Now, I love these monsters because they only make sense
00:24in a world where so many people
00:27are going into haunted dungeons
00:30that entire strains of monsters
00:32can evolve just to eat adventurers.
00:34Think about how rare of a food source
00:36an adventurer is on earth.
00:37And think about the fact that there's so many monsters
00:39out here being like,
00:40if I disguise myself as a treasure chest,
00:41at least one person a week is gonna open me
00:43and I'm gonna eat them.
00:44I would say my favorite D&D monster
00:47has to go to the owl bear, Hoot Growl,
00:49the mascot of the Aguefort Adventuring Academy
00:51and our favorite monster over at Dimension 20.
00:54Why would you mix an owl and a bear together?
00:56Bears are more dangerous than owls.
00:57Just have a regular bear.
00:58But no, we made them half owl.
01:00Incredible.
01:01No notes.
01:02This next question comes to us from at Sparrowboy.
01:04Is there any secret?
01:05How do you come up with such great character design
01:07and personality-wise?
01:09I always feel empty-headed
01:10when having to create a D&D character.
01:12The things that not only are fun right away,
01:14but stay fun and sustainable a long time
01:17are creating characters that are wrestling
01:20with a heroic problem that I can keep coming back to.
01:25Perhaps their wizarding academy was burned down
01:28or their parents were heroes that were betrayed.
01:31Perhaps a war is raging across these five kingdoms.
01:34Pick someone from one of those kingdoms
01:36with something to lose.
01:37Not only on a physical level,
01:38but an emotional one as well.
01:40Pick characters who care about the world they are in
01:44and you will find yourself swept away by adventure
01:47very quickly in D.
01:48That's my advice to you.
01:49This next question comes to us
01:50from at Iloveyourmom3, provocative.
01:54What's the greatest magic of all?
01:56Answer, friendship, right?
01:59The greatest magic of all is not friendship,
02:00it's chronomancy, the ability to control and warp time.
02:03If friendship were the greatest magic,
02:04look, it's a pet peeve of mine.
02:06Greatest magic of all, do you remember?
02:10Is friendship.
02:12What the fuck is wrong with you?
02:14There's a lot of stories out there
02:16where the greatest magic of all is love or friendship
02:20and it's like, oh, because you loved so well,
02:24it created a magic spell that protected you.
02:27That is so cruel to everybody else
02:30in that fictional world who died.
02:32Do you get it?
02:33If your love can magically protect you,
02:35then what follows from that
02:37is anyone who died didn't love hard enough.
02:39It's fucked up.
02:40Just think about it for two seconds, all right?
02:42You can't be doing that.
02:43The greatest magic of all is powerful magic
02:45and you should use that magic to help the people you love.
02:47They're not the same thing.
02:48Greatest magic of all, Crown of Mancy.
02:50At Rogelioval123.
02:53So exactly what are the stuff
02:55that you need to play Dungeons and Dragons?
02:57Do you need to buy separate sets of stuff
02:59or do you make it yourself?
03:01Rogelio, my friend, first thing you need is friends
03:04and that's hard to come by, I gotta tell ya.
03:07The hustle needed to get six people
03:09to clear a Wednesday night is the stuff of legend.
03:12The rules of the game are contained
03:15in typically three books.
03:17We refer to them as the core rule books.
03:19Sometimes the Dungeon Master will have those books
03:21available for you to come play.
03:22Sometimes they'll have them digitally,
03:24like on a service like D&D Beyond.
03:25Pencil and papers to record your character sheet.
03:27This is what a typical character sheet looks like.
03:30You can get these online and print them out for yourselves
03:32or you can store your character information
03:34on a digital character sheet as well.
03:36And some dice that generate random chants
03:40throughout the game.
03:41You wanna attack a dragon?
03:43Well, we don't just decide that.
03:44Where's the fun in that?
03:45We roll dice to see if you strike true or not.
03:49So with dice, pencil, and paper,
03:51some rule books, and some pals,
03:53you could be playing Dungeons & Dragons right away.
03:56Now, you may have seen a lot of D&D tables
03:59in popular media with cool little figurines
04:02and miniatures like my friends right here.
04:05These miniatures are, listen, we can all agree,
04:08dope as hell, but they are optional.
04:10Miniatures and counters and tokens
04:14are there to physically represent battle and combat,
04:18but that is technically an extra.
04:21You can, at your table, play in a style
04:24that is known as theater of the mind.
04:26I like to use the minis and the counters
04:28because there's a lot of abilities in D&D
04:31that are hard to keep track of.
04:32And having a battlefield set out, I think, is worthwhile
04:35so that if someone casts a fireball
04:38with one quick glance of my eyes,
04:40I know exactly how many enemies just blew up.
04:43This dragon has been one of my most long-used miniatures.
04:46I think I was like two, one or two years old
04:48when I got this dragon.
04:49He used to have a little spout of fire,
04:52but I might've chewed that off when I was a kid.
04:54Regardless, this dragon's been with me
04:55for a long, long time and served faithfully and well.
04:58Good boy.
04:59Next question.
05:00From DrinkYourHaterade on Reddit,
05:02what is the best representation of D&D in pop culture?
05:05With Stranger Things boosting D&D nostalgia,
05:07I've been thinking a lot about
05:08pop culture representations of D&D.
05:10What show or movie do you think
05:12has done the best job and why?
05:14I think What Stranger Things Did
05:15that really helped D&D at a moment
05:17when a lot of cultural forces were conspiring to lift it up
05:21and actually showed it as being really fun.
05:23Inherently social, inherently thrilling,
05:26a activity that brings people together
05:28in shared storytelling.
05:29Baldur's Gate.
05:30People got to fall in love with Karlak and Astarion
05:33and these amazing characters.
05:35And Try Not To Smooch,
05:37which is a part that they don't write about
05:38a lot in the textbooks,
05:39but believe me, when you get to play in the game,
05:41people wanna know if they can smooch.
05:43And at my table, as long as all parties involved
05:46have talked about it at session zero
05:47and everyone has their thumbs up across the board,
05:49if we're gonna be out here slaying and smiting,
05:52why not add smooching into the mix?
05:53What's so wrong with a nice smooch?
05:55I tell ya.
05:56There was also a D&D movie that came out recently
05:58that I think did a very good job.
06:00It had the tone and tenor.
06:02The worlds of Dungeons and Dragons
06:04are these arch, epic, fantasy universes.
06:07But the experience that most people have
06:08playing at the table is that things get goofy.
06:11There will be moments of romance.
06:12There will be moments of shock and danger and dismay.
06:14And so that movie did a good job of showing
06:16some of the lightheartedness that exists
06:18when you're actually playing
06:19through these D&D worlds together.
06:21At BuckDucky, I'm DMing a game for a bit
06:24and I'm trying to learn how to make a female voice
06:25for an NPC, but I'm very bad with voices.
06:29I think that it's a mistake to try to pitch up your voice
06:32for playing female characters.
06:34As a Dungeon Master, I have to play
06:36every different kind of person
06:37because I'm playing everybody in the world
06:39that my players are going through.
06:41Someone told me recently that the characters
06:42that I make sound like me,
06:45meaning when I voice the character,
06:46I just use my regular voice,
06:47are women and bad guys.
06:50That's something I should unpack with a professional.
06:53I don't know why that is,
06:54but that's who gets my real voice.
06:56I just use my regular voice when I'm playing women.
06:58Unless there's like a regional accent
07:00or they're older, you know,
07:01like if I'm playing the Baba Yaga.
07:03Did someone say a little bit of piss?
07:06Ancient folkloric Russian witch.
07:09Ehehehe, where's my pet?
07:12You do the voice for the character.
07:14I don't think you need to do
07:15like a stereotypical woman voice.
07:17At JLMoonlight92 asks,
07:20can you tell me how D&D alignments work?
07:22How do I know if someone's lawful good
07:25or any one of the others?
07:27Alignment is an element of tracking
07:30player character ideals.
07:32From earlier editions of the game,
07:33it was identified along two axes,
07:35your ethical and moral axes,
07:37and it produced nine alignments.
07:38Lawful good, paladins, heroic.
07:40Neutral good, most aligned with the good sphere above.
07:42Chaotic good, Robin Hood,
07:44those that stand against tyranny and oppression
07:46and fight for freedom.
07:48You have lawful neutral,
07:49which is a sort of automaton,
07:51rules for their own sake,
07:52neither good nor evil.
07:54True neutral, no values at all.
07:56Kind of cool, cynics maybe.
07:58Chaotic neutral, pure chaos for its own sake.
08:01Utter rebellion, anarchy.
08:02Lawful evil, the alignment of devils
08:05and those who seek conquest, tyranny, and oppression.
08:09Neutral evil, pure cruelty and oblivion.
08:11Chaotic evil, slaughter, rampage, ruin,
08:15sort of violence of the demonic realms.
08:18Those nine alignments, people love them
08:21because I don't know if you know this about human beings,
08:22they love personality charts.
08:24It's stuck around for a long time,
08:26even though it's not the most robust way
08:28to categorize moral philosophy,
08:30but goddamn people love a chart
08:32that tells them what kind of person they are.
08:34From CamilleDoesDnD,
08:36the difference between paladins and warlocks
08:38is one's got an employer and the other's got a sugar daddy.
08:40But like, which one is which?
08:42If anyone's got a sugar daddy, it's clerics.
08:45You know it and I know it.
08:46When we talk about paladins in D&D,
08:47we talk about heroic holy knights
08:50that swear an oath to an ideal.
08:51When we talk about warlocks,
08:52we talk about people that have sworn a pact
08:54to an otherworldly entity capable of granting them magic.
08:57I believe that technically warlocks
09:00have the sugar daddy reputation kind of locked down,
09:03but I would argue that clerics
09:05are in a very similar relationship.
09:07I think the difference between a warlock and a cleric
09:08is aesthetic more than it is anything sort of more tangible,
09:13but that's getting into fantasy cosmology and theology,
09:16which we simply don't have the time for.
09:19At Sizzletoopcos, why are wizards so squishy?
09:23What, you want hit points
09:24in addition to being able to bend reality with your mind?
09:27Wizards are so powerful.
09:28They're like the most powerful class in the game.
09:30If you can survive those low levels,
09:32you're gonna be dominating battlefields
09:33from here till the end game.
09:35D6 is fine.
09:37I come from 3.5, where they had D4 hit points.
09:40I think we should go back to that.
09:41I think they got it too easy as it is now.
09:43D6 hit dice.
09:44They should be squishy.
09:45Stay on the back line.
09:46Let your barbarian have some fun.
09:48This next question comes to us from Nguyen Ren.
09:50Among things I don't know,
09:52and I'm at this point kind of afraid to ask,
09:54don't be afraid,
09:55how many sets of dice do D&D players have and why?
09:58Do you have separate sets for different characters
10:00or for different quests?
10:01Just because they look cool.
10:02They look cool, my friend.
10:05Why not have as many as you can?
10:06I have an enormous pouch of dice.
10:09This is filled with dice.
10:13If I'm gonna throw an upcast cone of cold
10:16at my adventuring party,
10:17I need to have a ton of dice ready for that
10:19in the moment, ready to go.
10:21As you play the game longer,
10:22it actually is worthwhile to invest in more than one set.
10:25In your first set of dice,
10:26you will get seven different dice typically.
10:29The first and greatest of them all is the D20.
10:32We say the letter D for dice
10:35and then the number of sides on the die.
10:37So this is a D20 because it's a 20-sided die.
10:39Then we come down to the D12.
10:42I'm not gonna lie, it doesn't get a lot of action.
10:43It's sort of for barbarian hit dice, great axes,
10:47and not too much else in common play,
10:50but we love the D12.
10:51Fun fact about the D12, it never stops rolling.
10:53These next two dice I'm gonna show together,
10:56D10 and another D10,
10:58but you'll notice that this one
11:00has two digits in every place.
11:02So you roll these together
11:03and here in the tens digit, you produce a number.
11:06So that's an eight and then in this other digit,
11:08you produce a nine, that's an 89.
11:10Coming down from the D10, you have the D8.
11:13This one sees a lot of play.
11:14You're talking long swords and battle axes.
11:16There's a lot of cool higher level spells
11:18that do D8 damage.
11:20That's a real fun one.
11:21And then there's one for folks that have been strapped in
11:23going, what the hell is this guy talking about?
11:25The D6, you know this guy, you love the D6.
11:28This is like the normal die.
11:30We use the normal die,
11:32talking about fireball damage,
11:33talking about wizard hit dice.
11:35I use the D6 for recharging breath weapons,
11:38which you always hate to see, but you have to do it.
11:40It scares your PCs.
11:41It's great, it's fun.
11:42You will have these somewhere in your house,
11:44probably in a normal board game.
11:45Maybe you're playing with like a new board game
11:46night with friends and someone goes like,
11:48pass me the D6.
11:49You're like, ah, I caught you.
11:51You're a secret TTRPG player.
11:52Normal people don't call it a D6.
11:54They just call it dice.
11:55And then the D4.
11:57This one always trips people up
11:58because it's got multiple numbers on each side
12:01because it lands with its point pointing up
12:03and you have to see which numeral is upright.
12:07The D4 is the bane of messy housekeepers everywhere
12:12because if you let dice fall on the floor
12:14and you're walking at night to get a glass of water,
12:16this bad boy's going right in your foot like a Lego.
12:18I have stepped on these so many times.
12:20And additionally, these are used
12:21for the smallest numbers possible.
12:22So like attacking with a dagger,
12:24like the damage of a small knife is a D4.
12:27Your D4 will always be the last dice on the table
12:30because they're hard to pick up.
12:31And so you're there looking foolish,
12:33grasping at your hands with these up-pointed dice.
12:36Frankly, annoying dice.
12:37I find the D4 annoying.
12:39I can say that.
12:40We have a long relationship.
12:40You're not going anywhere.
12:41Some of these dice are reliable
12:43and their personalities are good
12:45and the D4 is not on that list.
12:46Sorry to say.
12:47Question here from at memes lich,
12:49should dungeon masters stop fudging dice rolls
12:52in Dungeons and Dragons?
12:53Fudging a die roll is something that a dungeon master
12:56can do with the aid of this handy little screen.
12:58It's called a dungeon master screen.
13:00You put that up at the table
13:01and all of a sudden, what am I up to back here?
13:04This screen enables you to do really fun stuff like this
13:06where you go, okay, the monster's gonna attack.
13:09Oh no.
13:10If you were to see that I rolled a two and still hit you,
13:13that might prompt you to be like,
13:14we need to run away from this battle right now.
13:16There's a lot of stuff that is reasonable
13:19to stay hidden behind a DM screen.
13:21A DM hides their stat blocks behind here.
13:23I usually make it a little homebrew index card
13:25with all the players like game stats on it.
13:27But there's then a temptation for some DMs
13:32to fudge die rolls.
13:34Typically, this is done to spare the player characters
13:38from a terrible fate.
13:40You're attacking your PC, it's the last one standing
13:43and they've got 10 hit points left
13:44and you roll that monster attack roll.
13:46Oh, it's a nat 20.
13:47They're about to do double damage.
13:49This is about to be the end of the campaign.
13:50Maybe they didn't roll a nat 20.
13:52Maybe you could say that they rolled something else.
13:55That temptation is there for DMs
13:58that suddenly get a soft heart for their PCs.
14:00At ride the dirt, also just some leftist, hell yeah.
14:04What is a golden rule you try to follow
14:06for hashtag D&D or other hashtag TTRPG for folks at home?
14:10That's tabletop role playing game.
14:12The golden rule I try to follow is
14:13you're playing with your fellow players first and foremost.
14:17If you follow every rule
14:19and stay completely in line with the module,
14:22the books are never gonna say thank you.
14:24You're playing with other human beings at the table.
14:26Stay tapped in to what their experience is.
14:29Are they having fun?
14:30Are you all telling a story together?
14:32That is the measure of a great tabletop game.
14:34At PHX Mall asks, what's your favorite character,
14:37race and class combo for D&D?
14:40I tend to come back to paladin and wizard.
14:43I love a paladin's oath, striving for honor and justice.
14:47We did a photo shoot a while back
14:49with wonderful Andrew Max Levy as a paladin.
14:51Who doesn't love a knight in shining armor?
14:53It's a classic hero archetype.
14:55And you get to smite.
14:56Who doesn't love to smite?
14:58Give me those D8s.
14:59And I also like wizards because they're very magical,
15:02but they weren't born that way.
15:03They had to work very hard to get magical,
15:05and I identify with that.
15:06But for the person asking this question of
15:08is there a certain advantage,
15:10typically there are certain things that dovetail.
15:14Like if you're gonna play a barbarian,
15:15which is a strength-based class,
15:17there are gonna be certain ancestries
15:18that give you a bonus to strength
15:20in some editions of the game.
15:22There's also some fun stuff about playing a character
15:23that's a little bit more well-rounded.
15:25Every so often it can be cool,
15:26even if you're playing a strength-based character,
15:28to go, oh, and because of this part of my background,
15:30I have a weird little cantrip or a magic spell I can do.
15:33Even though it might not be optimal,
15:35that weird little power that doesn't exactly
15:38fit into your build may be the thing
15:40that saves you and your friends from a total party kill.
15:44At delusionaldo1, how do you handle a TPK?
15:48Do you full reset or just pick up at the last save spot?
15:51Any other things you like to do after a party wipe?
15:53Handling a TPK, which for folks at home,
15:55is a total party kill.
15:57It is when every member of an adventuring party
16:00dies all at once.
16:01I think sometimes the best way to handle a TPK
16:04is before it happens.
16:06If you're heading towards a battle
16:09that is absolutely punishing and stands a chance
16:12of really wiping out everybody in the party,
16:15say it.
16:16Say it above the table and say it in-game.
16:18Have a moment where you check in with your players
16:19and go, hey, no shame in running.
16:22This has a chance of killing everybody in the party.
16:25Take your time.
16:27You approach the dungeon.
16:29Drums beat in the dark.
16:31Fires flicker from torchlight.
16:33The smell of death is everywhere.
16:36Taking the time to add some gravitas
16:39can sometimes wake your players up and go,
16:41oh, our buddy is suddenly being very dramatic and serious.
16:46I think we might be in trouble.
16:48If you do all that due diligence and say,
16:50hey, you can make a brave last stand here.
16:52You all may die.
16:53When they do, they had some agency in it.
16:57The thing that makes a TPK really unbearable
16:59is when players feel like it happened for no reason.
17:02At sessions canceled.
17:04Why do we always start games in tavern?
17:06Some groups tend to make their characters
17:09isolated from one another.
17:11Where do people congregate?
17:12In a medieval setting, in a public house,
17:14in a place of drink and libation and revelry.
17:17I would say probably there's a deeper answer here,
17:19and I haven't seen anything written about this,
17:21but I would hazard a guess that it is in
17:23maybe unconscious homage to the end
17:26of The Prancing Pony in Bree,
17:28where Strider first meets the hobbits
17:30in Lord of the Rings, which is a seminal text
17:32and serves as the basis for a lot of the lore
17:34within Dungeons and Dragons.
17:36This next question comes to us from At Rotten Work.
17:39Does anyone have any tips for a first time DM?
17:42I'm having my first session zero for a campaign tomorrow,
17:44and I am nervous, LOL.
17:47First of all, laughter will help,
17:49so I'm glad that you're lolling.
17:50Second of all, you're doing a session zero?
17:53My friend, you're way ahead of the curve.
17:56Session zero, for those who don't know,
17:57is a pre-campaign session where DMs will line up.
18:02Sometimes people will do character creation there.
18:04Sometimes that happens beforehand,
18:05and a session zero is just to line up
18:07what the adventure's gonna be about,
18:08any rules of engagement.
18:10So the fact that you have got your situation
18:12buttoned up enough that you're doing a session zero,
18:15you're off to a great start.
18:16Second of all, tips.
18:18What's the nugget, Brennan?
18:20What's the secret little sauce?
18:23There's not one!
18:24You gotta slug it out like the rest of us.
18:26You gotta get your hands dirty.
18:28You gotta jump in two boots first and run the game.
18:30Is your first session gonna be clean?
18:32Are you gonna remember every rule?
18:34Are you gonna nail every NPC?
18:36Maybe yes, maybe no, but the point is this.
18:39Your first session is the learning experience.
18:42You're gonna jump in and you're gonna learn
18:43so much more in that first session
18:47than any internet dungeon master could tell you.
18:50That being said, the answers lie in your players.
18:53Just listen to them, tap into what is bringing them joy,
18:56and you will do wonders, my friend.
18:59Rootin' for ya.
19:00This one's from atgary26817438.
19:0526 million and some odd Gary's before this one.
19:09What in the world is a critical role?
19:10Don't you mean a nat 20?
19:12You're thinking of a critical hit.
19:14A nat 20 is the highest possible roll on a 20-sided die.
19:18When you get that nat 20 roll on an attack roll,
19:21it's an automatic hit and it deals double damage.
19:23Thrilling.
19:23Most DMs, and I would say the fun ones,
19:26not to put myself on one side of a fence,
19:29will homebrew that a nat 20 is also an automatic success
19:33on a skill check.
19:34Now, this does certain things to game balance.
19:36The game rules as written does not say
19:38that a nat one is an automatic failure
19:40or a nat 20 is an automatic success,
19:42but I am part of a camp of dungeon masters
19:45that believe if the possibility for success or failure
19:48does not exist on a given roll,
19:50why are you asking for it in the first place?
19:52Just say it's impossible.
19:53If you're gonna ask someone to roll a die
19:55and they roll a nat 20 and they still don't succeed,
19:59it doesn't feel very good, and we're here to feel good, so.
20:02This next question is from andydoodle56.
20:05Question for hashtag dungeon masters.
20:07If D&D is improv, in parentheses, yes, and,
20:10with dice, what do you do when the dice
20:12really don't want to tell the same story that you do?
20:16There's a great expression,
20:17which is that the dice tell the story.
20:18You're taking a d20, you're rolling it.
20:20It's the most climactic roll of the campaign.
20:22I attack and get an 11.
20:25I needed it at a 19 or higher.
20:26I missed my opportunity.
20:27Perhaps I will be struck down the mountainside here.
20:30Your job as a dungeon master is to immediately start
20:33to think about what the story beat is
20:35that accompanies failure.
20:37Failure is not anathema to storytelling.
20:40Failure is a key and critical component of storytelling.
20:44Downbeats, moments of ruin and wrath,
20:47these are what drive heroes on to greater and greater ends.
20:50The reason we play with these dice
20:52is so that we can surrender control.
20:55Maybe this isn't the big heroic victory you thought it was.
20:58Maybe this is actually a setback.
20:59At wildmagicsurge, what's your favorite D&D 5e spell?
21:05Oh man, is it shield?
21:07I love shield.
21:08It's just really fun.
21:09Reaction, plus five to your armor class.
21:12I think, favorite D&D 5e spell, fireball, fly.
21:16They're all good.
21:17I will say this, third level is the best spell level.
21:20All the most fun spells are third level spells.
21:22At Lee, 51,765,627.
21:27I want to learn to play Dungeons & Dragons.
21:29How do I find people willing to play with a newbie?
21:31Well yeah, I love playing with newbies.
21:32Playing with newbies is the best,
21:35but you are right, it is hard to find a group to play with.
21:37I think the best thing to do, honestly,
21:39is if you have people you're close with,
21:42you have a group of friends, all learn the game together.
21:45It doesn't matter if you're stumbling through it.
21:47It doesn't matter if it feels arcane or Byzantine
21:49or it's hard to get through.
21:50The important thing is you're spending time
21:51with people you care about and you love.
21:53If the crew around you, if your friends and network
21:56aren't as interested in tabletop games as you are,
21:58frequenting game nights at your local game store.
22:01Have game nights where you can come and meet people
22:03and join a table.
22:04There's also services online to find physical
22:07but also digital play groups.
22:09So Start Playing Games is a company that serves
22:11as a sort of matchmaker to not only hook people up
22:14with other people to play with, but also Dungeon Masters.
22:17Matching services for Dungeon Masters
22:19that charge for their services.
22:20There's free Dungeon Masters,
22:21there's free groups that get together there.
22:23All these things are available for you at your disposal.
22:25So there's a range of options, but yes,
22:27it is a challenge, but there are ways to do it.
22:29Here's one from Beck Schwartz on Blue Sky.
22:32Thanks, Becks!
22:33Hi, intrepid hero Brennan Lee Mulligan.
22:35How does your prep for an adventure
22:37in someone else's campaign, such as Exandria
22:40in Critical Role's Calamity, differ from preparation
22:41for the Worlds Beyond Number that you are building?
22:44Thank you for the question, Becks.
22:45I deeply appreciate it.
22:46Shout out to Worlds Beyond Number, the podcast
22:48that I do with Aabria Iyengar, Eric Ishii,
22:50and Lou Wilson, edited by Taylor Moore.
22:52I was fortunate enough to get invited to come
22:54and run a series in Exandria for Critical Role
22:58as a part of their Exandria Unlimited series.
23:00Basically, whenever they need someone to crash
23:02a flying city somewhere in the history of Exandria,
23:05Matt calls me up, they light the little bat signal,
23:08and I come in and make everybody sad.
23:11At the core of your question is how do you create
23:14your own world from scratch versus how do you create
23:17a meaningful story in a world created by someone else?
23:20Creating the homebrew world of Umora from scratch
23:23for this epic fantasy podcast to stepping into Exandria,
23:27the incredible world of Matt Mercer and Critical Role
23:31that has been established over now three full campaigns
23:34and adapted into the Legend of Vox Machina animated shows.
23:37Pick your poison, right?
23:38A lot of DMs rely on pre-published modules.
23:41Exandria has incredible sourcebooks that give a DM
23:44the tools to jump into an established
23:47and exhaustively beautiful and rich fantasy world
23:51to just start telling your story in it.
23:53Other DMs actually sort of tend towards wanting
23:56to create from homebrew themselves,
23:58wanting to make their own setting
24:00and to be sort of the ultimate authority
24:02on where that world was and what was gonna be going on in it.
24:05The prep is very different and they're both wonderful.
24:07Short answer is you gotta do a lot more reading
24:09for this one, and in this one,
24:10you gotta do a lot more writing.
24:12There's something really beautiful and delightful
24:13about writing fiction in someone else's setting.
24:15Anyone now who's writing a Star Wars show
24:18is someone who grew up probably loving Star Wars.
24:20So there's an amazing focus on coming to something
24:24that you are a fan of and getting to light a little candle
24:27in that world.
24:28At Floraroon, a question for D&D and TTRPG friends.
24:32What is your favorite magical item?
24:34The immovable rod!
24:35Small metal wand that has a button on it
24:39and when you click it, it cannot be moved in space.
24:42That might sound trivial.
24:44The amount of shenanigans people get up to
24:46clicking it to fly, like jumping up like an acrobat.
24:49Someone was on an airship being chased by another airship,
24:53leaned off the back, clicked it, and left it in the air,
24:56and then you have to decide what happens
24:57when an airship collides with a ruler-sized bar of metal
25:01that cannot be moved no matter what.
25:04Chaos!
25:05The immovable rod.
25:06This next one's from Brysingwolf on Reddit.
25:08What common D&D-related behavior or quirk
25:11really grinds your gears?
25:13Mine is when people call the fighter class the warrior
25:15or call the wizard the mage.
25:17Not even sure why, but it makes me hate you a little.
25:19Brysingwolf, do not give in to hate.
25:21They know not what they do.
25:22I think for me, probably the biggest pet peeve
25:26has to do with a player making a choice as a character
25:31that really grinds the adventure to a halt.
25:36I think sometimes people will hide behind
25:37the sort of lens of it's what my character would do
25:41and will do things that are a little bit
25:42antisocial at the table.
25:44And ultimately, there's not that much
25:45a dungeon master can do if you decide
25:48that your character wouldn't go on an adventure.
25:51If a DM comes out and says, your village is in danger,
25:54your loved ones are in jeopardy,
25:56the fate of the world hangs in the balance
25:58and you and you alone hold the sword of destiny,
26:01and you go, I run, I'm getting out of Dodge, good luck.
26:05Well, that's kind of the story over.
26:07At actually, I am incorrect.
26:10What's your favorite weird niche bit of lore
26:11that isn't fully developed?
26:12D&D created a cosmology for the afterlife called Planescape.
26:16And it made it really, really weird
26:18because they never kind of thought you were gonna go there.
26:21And then they built an addition
26:22that was actually set there.
26:23An infinite tower arises and ends in a torus of stone,
26:26like a big stone donut.
26:27On the inside rim of that donut is the city of Sigil.
26:30And within Sigil, there is a lady of pain
26:33who has forbade all gods from entering that city.
26:36And her servants are known as the Dabus.
26:39Tony, Deirdre, Lizzie, the original illustrator for them,
26:41I always think of them as big, tall,
26:42white-haired Oos from Ooville.
26:44And they speak through emoji.
26:47They make little weird hieroglyphs out of light
26:51over their heads that only the Dabus can read.
26:53I think about them every day.
26:55What a crazy bit of lore.
26:56At Aiden Lair says,
26:58why did people think playing D&D was satanic?
27:01You're literally fighting Hellspawn half the time.
27:03That's a great question, Aiden.
27:04There's sort of two answers to this.
27:05One is D&D, by involving elements of folklore and mythology,
27:11had elements of things adjacent to the occult.
27:14There's a deeper answer, which is that back in the 1980s,
27:17it was like evangelical moral panic about that.
27:21But really, the evangelical right in this country
27:23needs to manufacture outrage to hold onto its voting bloc.
27:26So that's your real answer.
27:27It was arbitrary, as the targets of their outrage always are.
27:32You know, fight the power.
27:33Are you gonna include that?
27:36This next question comes to us from Shuffleupagus.
27:38I wonder how much prep a DM like
27:40hashtag Brennan Lee Mulligan does.
27:42Like, dot, dot, dot, what do his notes look like?
27:45My notes are garbage.
27:48I have terrible notes.
27:49My 14-year home game that I ran,
27:50the system I had for how to manage the lore,
27:53was a, at the end of 14 years,
27:55412-page, indecipherable Google Doc.
28:01Paragraphs of lore interspersed
28:02with random initiative counts,
28:04unlabeled as to what battle they referenced.
28:07Terrible stuff.
28:08So, if there's any part of you
28:10that doubts your abilities as a GM,
28:13based on having seen a GM out there in the world
28:16with, like, an incredible digital spreadsheet,
28:18or I know DMs whose prep work is flawless.
28:22Matt Mercer rolls up to the table
28:25with stapled sheets of paper
28:28with all of the lore of the setting,
28:29and I got, like, a bullet point list on a Google Doc,
28:32and a wish and a prayer, and that's about it.
28:34I rely a lot on improvisation.
28:37That stresses some DMs out.
28:38Other people rely a lot on preparation.
28:41That stresses other DMs out.
28:42Find your style that's right for you.
28:45It brings the most joy to your players and your table.
28:48This one's from at Yum DM.
28:50How many different editions of D&D do you actively play?
28:53I play, most actively, 5E.
28:56Up until last year, I was also playing 3.5 extremely actively.
29:00There are many editions of the game.
29:02I came into the game playing second edition.
29:04You wanna talk about Crunch,
29:05come talk to me about Thaco, baby, to hit Armor Class Zero.
29:09Imagine a 10-year-old boy
29:11with two sliding sheets of graph paper
29:13to align a set of negative integers
29:16with the value of a die roll.
29:19That required some math.
29:21Negative numbers are good, tough.
29:23However, there are also many other games,
29:25aside from D&D, that I play.
29:26Other big ones like Vampire the Masquerade,
29:28Call of Cthulhu, Blades in the Dark.
29:31My friend J.Dragon does Wander Home
29:33and Yzabe's Bed and Breakfast.
29:34There's great indie games out there
29:36for anyone who is like, oh, I've had a taste
29:38of heroic fantasy in playing Dungeons & Dragons,
29:41but I want a sci-fi experience,
29:42or I want a more poetic experience,
29:44or an even crunchier experience.
29:45The world of tabletop role-playing games awaits you.
29:48This next one comes to us from at Warforgedice.
29:51D&D players, how do we feel
29:53about the new D&D rules slash mechanics?
29:54Hey, I hear ya.
29:56I know that we loved so much
29:59of the old way the game was played.
30:00The changes to Counterspell and to Divine Smite.
30:03Ask yourself this.
30:04If you were making a wizard or a paladin,
30:07were you allowed to do anything other than those abilities?
30:10No, you were not.
30:11Counterspell needed to be altered a little bit.
30:13Divine Smite needed to be altered a little bit.
30:15Every damage-dealing build that was a super damage dealer
30:18had to involve Divine Smite.
30:19It was mandatory.
30:20Counterspell, mandatory.
30:22And any time an ability in a game is mandatory,
30:25you have to ask yourself
30:26if it's a little bit out of balance.
30:28And the druids, letting them talk in wild shape?
30:30Yes, let them talk.
30:32I always want them to be able to talk in wild shape.
30:33That's a rule that just helps DMs out.
30:35When has it ever been helpful
30:36for someone to not be able to speak?
30:37It's never helpful.
30:39Let the druids talk.
30:39I want that dog to talk.
30:41At NotCavid, okay, but what if I said
30:43I wanted to play a Wild West-setting D&D campaign?
30:45What then?
30:46We've played in many, many different kinds of settings
30:48and genres all across the spectrum.
30:50We have Fantasy High, where we play D&D
30:53in a high school for fantasy heroes.
30:55We play The Unsleeping City.
30:57At Madison Square Garden, as a live show,
30:59we're playing D&D at the garden in New York City
31:01because The Unsleeping City is set
31:03in a magical version of New York City.
31:05We even played a Starstruck Odyssey
31:07set in the sci-fi setting of Anarch Era,
31:11written by noted comics author Elaine Lee.
31:12Also, my mom, if you can believe that.
31:15I adapted my mom's comic book series into a D&D campaign.
31:18There's a lot of people who enjoy homebrewing
31:21and stretching the creative boundaries,
31:22chop-shopping or jury-rigging
31:24what they want their game to be about.
31:27Everyone has a different play style,
31:28and all are valid and good.
31:30At Dickey Minaj, so there's a Dungeons & Drag Queens show,
31:33and I'm just finding out about this.
31:35Yes, you can come over to Dropout.tv,
31:37where we play a miniseries called
31:39Dungeons & Drag Queens.
31:40Say hi, questing queens!
31:42Hi, questing queens!
31:45With some of the best drag performers in the world,
31:47Bob the Drag Queen, Alaska Thunderf**k,
31:49Jujubee, and Monet X Change,
31:51who are so wonderful and incredible players
31:54and had the bravery and the chutzpah
31:56to sit down and play D&D for the first time
31:58on camera with me.
32:00They were phenomenal.
32:01The number one thing that you wanna look for
32:03in a new player is how much they care
32:05and how invested they are.
32:07And all of them went into it with their full heart
32:09and were just naturals right away.
32:11Took to the game so effortlessly,
32:13it was a joy and a privilege to behold.
32:15Next one comes to us from BugHopD.
32:17My son just asked a D&D question
32:19I don't know how to answer.
32:19What does a mimic look like when it's not mimicking?
32:22In their natural state, mimics appear as amorphous shapes
32:24with speckled gray skin, similar in appearance to granite.
32:27But since they are such shape-changing extraordinaires,
32:30you'll rarely encounter one in its regular form.
32:32Mimics are shape-changers, much like doppelgangers.
32:34We had a mimic in our high school
32:36for heroes setting fantasy high
32:37that looked like a standard examination room desk.
32:41I like to imagine that they have a penchant
32:44for disguising themselves exclusively as furniture.
32:47So, those are all our questions for today.
32:49I'm wishing all the best to you and your table.
32:51May all your hits be crits,
32:53and I hope you learned a lot here
32:55about the wonderful world of tabletop role-playing games.
32:58From here at D&D Support, Bradley Mulligan, signing off.