Improv and the Unexpected (GM Tips w/ Matt Mercer) 

It is a player's prerogative to never do what you intended. You plan out options A, B, and C and they choose option Triangle.

it would be cool to have matt go back and do commentary on moments he was caught off guard and fill us in on what he was thinking at the moment.

The first casualty of the game session is the DMs plan.

While DMing, I once had the party run into an Ogre Blacksmith who turned out to be a human cursed into ogre form. Dude's name was Vance. Nice guy but kind of a recluse. He just wanted to be left alone with his son out in the woods, hiding from the rest of the world, waiting to get revenge on the bastard that cursed him. He passed the time smithing for the hell of it and by the time they met him, he had amassed a rather sizable armory that wasn't being put to any good use. The party later helped Vance stave off an attack by assassins sent by the guy who had cursed Vance in the first place. His cave/blacksmith dwelling became the party's go-to hang out spot and personal smithing source soon after. Fast forward a few plot threads later. The party came across a small village in a forest adjacent to the one Vance lived in. They were being attacked by a band of savage bugbears led by a murderous Sasquatch almost every night for the past month. I figured, "sheeeit, the party'll kill off the Squatch and the bugbears then be on their way right?" WRONG. Fuckers did not simply fight the monsters, they riled up the villagers and persuaded them to fight alongside the party to eventually take down Big Bad Squatch guy. (Specifically, party Monk punched his face off after party Dragonborn lit him on fire with breath weapon) I figured, "Alright, that was awesome and now it's over. They'll move on and get back to the main story hook." Once again, I was wrong.... The party got invested in the village and decided "hey, there could still be worse monsters out there in the woods. We won't always be here to protect them". So somehow (through a few unexpectedly good rolls) the party convinced a village of near-50 people to trudge through the forest with them as escorts and eventually made their way to Vance's place. (ALL THE WAY IN ANOTHER FUCKEN FOREST) They eventually convinced Vance to let the villagers stay at his crib and before ya knew it, a wholly new village formed around Vance's cave. Its citizens armed to the teeth with expertly crafted weaponry, and a big ass Ogre watching their backs, all the while the newfound sense of community and family helped Vance come to terms with his being a freakish but charming Ogre-man and become more open to the outside world. We now have a new hub town named after the Monk (Turtle Style Martial Arts) and Dragonborn who were key in taking down the Sasquatch and saving the villagers called Dragon-Turtle Village. And that is the story of how 2 completely unrelated sub-quests turned into something far greater than I ever could've imagined either of them could've been... creative bastards...

What I wouldn’t give to play, even just once, with Matt. Not even because he’s a famous actor, but because he’s just a damn great DM.

I made a joke skeleton encounter in the first dungeon my players explored. He plays a flute of charm skeleton. Instead of killing the skeleton and taking the flute to discover its power later on, the took the skeleton (who is always nonhostile and dancing) and shoved him into the bag of holding. They use him whenever a bar needs livening up or they're fighting hordes of undead. I believe they named him, although idk what name they gave him.

Kids in school "Taking notes is a waste of time" DMs "I WENT THROUGH A FIVE SUBJECT NOTEBOOK IN TWO HOURS!"

RPGs are like the jazz of storytelling- you prepare a crap-ton so you can fly by the seat of your pants and adeptly improvise! But don't worry, the longer and the more you do it, the better you get as a GM! -Ryan

While DMing I once had my party take a mercenary hostage in the very first combat encounter they ever had. After releasing him they later found him again while ambushing the leader of the mercenary group. They left only him alive, taking him hostage again and dragging him along with them as their booby trap setter offer and the like. He'd try to escape, get caught, try to escape again. Many unlikely roles and 20 levels later, nondescript level 1 fighter became "Haus" ( short for hostage), the lawful good moral compass of the party that we used for people who wanted to drop in and try out D&D, who fullfilled his destiny by sacrificing himself to destroy the world-ending relic in the campaign climax. Have to say I didn't prepare for that one.

I had a "Steve" in one of my campaigns. I didn't have a name for an archmage so I went with the first thing that came to mind... Steve the Lich ended up being one of the major antagonists for the entire campaign, which was made even better by his love of humorous (but no less infuriating or dangerous) magical traps and bizarre dungeons.

I'd trust this one, his creations are glorious.

I had a player burn through a months worth of side quests and plot thanks to some lucky rolls and brute force tactics in a single session... I feel this episode... I feel it...

I didn't notice last episode but the Unicorn goblet I sent him for Critmas is on the table. YAY!!!

One of my best pieces of advice for GMs is to hold what I call a "Session 0" where you and your players get together and discuss the party's shared past. Are characters related? Childhood friends? Business partners? It gives players a genuine stake in everyone else's goals and actions as opposed to each being a story island unto themselves. Then take each player aside and let them come up with events or information that only they are privy too, this gives everyone at the table a level of social currency, information that only they can provide and can choose to withhold until they feel like the moment is the most dramatic.

The "painting the scene on improv" tip was THE MOST IMPORTANT

As much as I love and appreciate the content of these "advanced" GM tips, I can honestly say I would just as happily watch Matt talk about pumpernickel bread or do a review on classical literature. Just about anything to be honest. Also, I think it would be AMAZ-BALLS to watch him interview his players about this stuff. Just my measly 2¢'s.

The best tip I ever give a new GM is a simple four words; "I hate you guys". When someone decides to go too far off your carefully crafted plot threads just laugh, shake your head, smile and sigh "I hate you guys" in that endearing way that lets them know you've already added more guys to the next encounter. It sounds really stupid, but it gets a laugh, the table eases up for a minute and it gives you a few extra seconds to work out the ramifications of what the player's just said and how it all fits in, because the party WILL find an ironclad way to get the big bad to help them/decide to become gods/enact the plot of DOOM/invade the neighbouring country/enslave the kindly villagers/all of the above* and you'll need to work out how it affects the rest of the world. And seriously, take notes. *My last campaign ran every week for eight months. These examples are from one session. All of them.

That look of "yeah... nope.... kill the npcs....uh huh, didn't see that coming" that's my party in a nutshell. I just write down names as it is now, my party are not friendly to others.

Taking notes is incredibly important. In one of the games I am playing in, I am playing an investigator type. So his entire shtick is writing notes. Thing is I was the only one taking notes on what was going on during the story, so there were several times when the DM would ask me for my notes on the previous session. Mostly he would use this for names and sub-plots involving my character. However, there was a time the DM's computer went down and he could not get to his notes on what had just happened. Low and behold, my guy had all these notes on everything that had happened leading up to that moment (I think we were fighting some BBEG in a canyon at the time). On top of that, I had made several observations about the characters we had encountered along the way. Mostly just me stating what I thought there personality was like and how best to utilize them if the need were to ever arise. Thing is, the DM had not made any personal notes on how those characters might act or what they were like, so when I handed him my notes he got a lot of personal thoughts on what my character thought of the world. Suffice it to say, some of the characters started to act more in line to what my notes had said. Kind of an odd complement if I'm being honest.

Hey Geek & Sundry! Matt, thanks to you i've started my own campaign, but not with normal people, I'm a teacher in training and my campaign is with students at the school where I teach and THEY LOVE IT. I'm from Belgium so English is a third language here but it really works to get people talking, one of my pupils is already doing voices and it's only been two sessions! This is my science project for school and if it takes off I might start doing workshops for other teachers so they themselves can host their own campaign to improve our pupils' English. So yeah thanks to you and the Critical Role cast for inspiring me and making me fall in love with this game. Now I can make others do the same as well.

I will never forget my first DMing session: I had been preparing for this for little over one month, culminating in 5 different potential quest threads, a roughly mapped town and several important NPCs, all encounters and rewards considered and scaled. How did we spend the first 2 HOURS of the session? Trying to get a cupcake (and subsequently the recipe) Admittedly, it probably only took 2 hours because I decided to make it as hard as possible for my players after purposefully ignoring the obvious plot points I was dangling in front of them. It then lead to a new secret society, a personal quest for one of my players and probably one of my favourite NPCs to role play but still, that's what made it memorable.

Matt! Please please please please PLEASSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSE! We NEED a behind-the-scenes series for Critical Role. What stories did you plan? What weird turns did the party take? What do your PCs do that you love and hate? What important characters did they kill off without a second thought? What improvised random character became a long-lasting favorite? These GM tips are great! But it would be AMAZING to hear the insider GM scoop behind this great game and series! Two specific questions I've long wanted an answer to: (1) did Clarota always exist in that cave waiting to help the party, or did you create him on the spot when the party wouldn't stop dicking around outside the encampment? (2) Did Clarota always intend to betray the party on his return home, or was his loyalty and friendship to the party brainwashed/assimilated away? A peek behind not just a generic GM screen but behind your Critcal Role GM screen would just be the greatest thing ever!

Keep a list of names at hand. Whenever you see something that makes you think "that's a nice fantasy name" add it to the list.

The life of a GM: 50% crafting amazing stories and lore, 50% pulling things out of your ass!

Speaking of collectors, we were tasked by one to acquire a set of items (Some gems, dragon parts, a dagger and most importantly - a feather. A standard feather, yes). Every time we got close to each item, a group of hooded men appeared and took it. After some investigation, we learnt that those people were trying to perform a ritual of summoning (DM never told us of what), so we went to their cave to take the components back. And then brought them to that elf-collector. Somehow it never raised any suspicion in us that he need the exact set of items required for that ritual. After receiving the reward, we decided to buy a castle just outside of a city(a suspiciously large sum, yes). As we were exploring it, DM describes a loud cracking sound coming from the outside, everything around us trembles, mirrors shatter... We run to the balcony. The sky is dark, blue lightnings crackle in the clouds. Where once stood a beautiful palace, we only saw a massive crater covered in smoke, it's charred peaces were floating in the air, seemingly unaffected by the force of gravity. When the party went there to learn what had happened, one of the few survivors described an elf in lavish clothes, walk into the throne room and stub himself with a dagger, covered in glowing runes. As the life left his body, the walls began to crumble. A few minutes later, the ground shook as the palace was consumed in an explosion of dark energy. That was the collector.

I sent my party to take over a fort. Needless to say they posed as chefs and poisoned ALL OF THEM. Great job guys.

In one campaign I wrote, there was a captain of the local gaurd, who denied my characters entrance into his city as they were very secretive. So one of my characters, an elvish rouge who chose to play as chaotic neutral, convinced my entire party to just break in. Long story short, they failed on their first attempt at stealth and ended up brutally murdering the ENTIRE town militia, both civilian and soldier, and had an improvised boss fight with the leader who had denied them entry. The whole thing turned into a mess when they looted the town. Eventually they took over and decided to rule.

My party once nagged me to run a session when I wasn't prepared, and they were resting on the Rock of Braal in the 2E Spelljammer setting. During the resulting Macguffin hunt, there were several moments when the party were ahead of me in the plot by 10 minutes or more, and I still managed to improv my way to a satisfactory solution to the mystery. And I asked them afterwards, and they didn't realise :D

Matt always gives great tips. Idea: G&S should do a few Player Tips episodes and bring on some of the other cast. I have a feeling they would be well received.

Thanks Matt!! I just turned DMing over to a friend of mine so I get some time as a PC. I definitely will show your tips to help him out too!

My favorite tip by far from this video is that very little time is wasted when you make extra preparations of stuff that won't get used in that particular story. You can always reuse them (with some alterations if necessary). Pretty obvious, but I hadn't thought of it, and it's actually a huge deal. Now I can prepare a shit ton without feeling stupid for wasting time :)

As a starter dungeons master its been really hard, but these videos are really helpful, so thank you Matt Mercer for doing this.

I’m seriously considering using this plan for when I panic: the cult of Steve. Steve is almost everywhere. He’s a chill guy, seekingly immortal. Likes bugs and basketball for some reason he keeps popping up and seems to be in on all the gossip the town has. Steve has a trustworthy face. You’re pretty sure Steve is a god of something, probably pot. It would explain alot

I actually laughed out-loud a couple times remembering exact times some of these things happened to me over the last 30 years and I cannot say how many time letting the paranoid ramblings of my players work out details for me that I wasn't prepared for has saved an awkward encounter. Bravo!

Thanks for these videos Matt. To learn from watching you is one thing, but these little tid bits behind the scenes are fantastic and so helpful. Thank you

This series is seriously the best. I wanna run a game again now! See what you've wrought, Mercer!

Also know your world. I've written up my own and are currently running a 90% improvised campaign with some friends and just knowing what is in the world and what is in most cities just makes it that much easier.

I like the editing. Very fitting camera work. Kudos, whoever is in charge of that. :D

Are used to think you were just a RU-vidr but recently found out that you were a voice actor in some of my favorite TV shows as a kid and now every time I watch your videos I feel like I'm meeting a celebrity

Really enjoying this series of vids, Matt, thanks!

Your voice and mannerisms are incredible! love just hearing you explain these things!

Thank you Mr. Mercer for putting together these videos. I want to start DMing myself and I've been intimidated by just what to do. So thank you for helping out us rookies find our footing.

Appreciate all of these video tips for budding or even long-time GMs. Even the most literary of persons could use some kind of guide for holding a not-only enthralling but safely, organized D&D session! Thank you very much Matthew for the upload!

thank you for the advice! this will definitely help me as I'm just now starting to GM!

This is super helpful. My only problem is the note taking part. I always try, but I get distracted by actually taking the notes, and sometimes lose track of what my players are doing, even if I'm trying to scribble things down quickly and simply. Just something I still have to work on! Thanks for all the tips, Matt!

Note taking is indeed a must! I found out that making some sort of "session minutes" after the session is SOOOO good. I take notes while DMing, then use those notes in the end plus the just fresh memories to write down sort of a well organized diary with references to things like: where the party was, what info did they get, what did they do, who did they see and talked with, etc.

My preferred way of taking notes is using a calendar. Pharmacies give them out for free here near the beginning of a new year, so I try to get a couple for use later on, and it lets me keep track of what happened in broad lines on which day of the year for my players. I asked them which day of the year they wanted to start their adventure, and have been keeping track of how long their travel and rests are day by day, writing the important events into the boxes. Good way of keeping track of things like teleportation circles which have to be cast for a year before becoming permanent; the calendar has the relevant date so I can write it down in the next calendar early and know when they get there. Of course, buying a large calendar with bigger squares would mean more room for notes, but I'm fairly good about remembering details. Most of the time. I did forget the name of a fairly important diplomat, once... but that wouldn't have been a problem if my players bothered to take any notes at all in the first place. Nothing! Not a single note out of them for months! At all! I watch Vox Machina sift through their papers and find the name of an NPC they met once three years ago, but my players can't be arsed to write down the name of an important foreign diplomat on a peace mission to the empire they live in!

Just recently, my party had come into a massive kingdom. A town crier was shouting out news about a local cult, but I didn't think of the name of the place where people could go to inquire about helping. Instead of apologizing to my players, I incorporated my forgetfulness into the game and actually made it look like the man had forgotten. A tiny slip-up that I was able to save by simply rolling with the punches.

yeah... Steve is a pretty common name in my campaigns as well

This. This one episode has it all. Gorgeous.

Loved this episode of GMMMM tips. Thanks Matt and G&S!

My favorite improvisation tactic is letting the players invent it. If it is outside the main plot (and frequently even inside it), players can create and destroy their stories. There are a few benefits on this: 1) Players will quickly red herring themselves as they extrapolate on their own ideas, which allows you to surprise them later on. Example: Players will likely guess names for a note or letter signed only with initials, which will allow you to introduce a character with that name to hurt them, help them, or cause chaos. 2) Players regularly come up with crazier stuff than the GM will ever think of. See also: Don't give the GM ideas to iterate on and bring back later 3) Players are more involved in a world they create. Reduces railroading if they have meaningful options in world creation.

I want to thank matt because just the other day i did my first campaign as a GM and these videos were a big help

As someone who will be running a Vampire: Requiem game at some point in the next few months, I am so excited for these tips! Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge with us!

Probably one of my favoriye moments as a DM was when my players walked into a room and found a Thayan Wizard alone, messing with the stuff in her bedroll. I expected the group to kill her. Our Berserker liked her, wrapped her up in the bedroll, then asked for her name. Thus was Lily the Invoker born, scroll maker extraordinaire, and helped in the war against Thay.

Thank you for continuing to make these!

Matthew, you are my biggest inspiration for mastering, and I really love the way you use your voice acting abilitties to bring your character to life. Could you make a video on how to make different voices for our characters??

Taking notes is basic! Before I start: I'm a Spanish speaking person, so I apologize if my English is a little broken. I am currently home-brewing an Evil campaign. Making long story short, I'm using the "Magic the gathering" story and I added a few things here and there. One of the main things that I added into this roleplay is that most of the cool things can be bought only in a place called "The Planeswalker place" which is pretty much like a little dimension where only the Planeswalker's have access to but this place also has a chain of command and their own laws. At some point of the story, the party gets noticed by the counsel of the Planeswalker place and therefore, the party can't no longer go back there so they encountered themselves having issues to buy items, spells, armor, etc. So I had to come up with a way to make sure that they could keep buying stuff so I decided to develop some kind of "black market" and thanks to that they've met several different NPC's that could sell them useful stuff and they were okay with it. During the next few sessions, the party was wandering around an abandoned town and out of the blue I remembered a meme about Khajits from the Elder scrolls games in where the Khajit says something like "Khajit has wares, if you have coin" so just for the lolz when the party separated to cover more ground one of the players heard a voice saying "hey...come closer" while going up a ladder, when this player turned around the only thing she saw was an stray cat staring at her, when she kept climbing she heard "Hey...where are you going??" and then she turned around again and she saw the cat starting at her again, she smiled at me and she said "Are you serious?". The stray talking cat then said: "Hey, you are Sunshine right? (The character's name) Follow me!" and the character decided to follow the cat. After a few jumps here and there they managed to get to the roof of the building and then the cat jumped into an empty carton box and then started to take items out (Health potions, spells, etc) and then said "Khajit has wares...if you have coin". When they were done with the purchasing the cat placed all his items back and then jumped back into the box and when Sunshine checked the box, the box was empty, the cat and the wares were no longer there. She had this idea of taking the empty box with her and then it just hit me: Why not making a "Clan"? During the next few sessions, the "Khajits" became important, the party had a "portable" shop and everytime that they had to buy something, they just placed the box in the ground, knock a few times and a different cat would go out to sell them thing, ALWAYS using the slogan "Khajit has wares....if you have coin" whenever the cat would pop-out (The players even made me do the "thing" if for some reason I forgot to use the slogan when they wanted to buy something). The point is that the party loved these NPC's so much that they became obsessed with getting to know what was the lore behind them to the point that I had to come up with how these guys worked, create a lore, sub-types, etc. Pretty much, the "Khajits" are the the owners of the black market and the "Khajits" do not only dedicate themselves to sell, but there are mercenaries, assassins, artificers, anything that a Planeswalker might need but can't get since they are "banned" from the planeswalker place. At the beginning, all the "Khajits" were cats, but then the players made it to a point were they decided to ask why a "Khajit" had to necessarily be a cat, the salesman didn't knew the answer and they just dropped the question. Several sessions later when they tried to buy something, I surprised them when I started to describe a bear cub coming out of the box, they started to ask this NPC several questions about why he wasn't a cat and then the bear cub explained to them that the Khajit that they had previously asked about why they were only cats was a Khajit Manager covering for one of his guys that called in sick that day and this Khajit took those questions to the "King Khajit" and after debating for a few months they decided to start "recruiting" from different species and not limiting themselves to only get cats to do the job. That's when they noticed that the "Khajit" was not a race, but a profession. Several sessions later, the party received an invitation to become "Khajits" themselves, but their role would be not to sell, but to be mercenaries and get "coin" and items in exchange as long as the missions were completed. Having them accept joining the Khajits allowed me to extend the story quite a lot and also implement several ideas that I had but that I couldn't put into the game since the party was always doing different stuff at a different places, but now since the party receives requests here and there from the Khajits, now I can use these ideas without making it look that I am "railroading" them under the excuse that "The Khajits are requesting that the party takes care of X or Y thing". My point is that taking notes is essential because if I didn't I would had forgotten that first of all, they took the carton box and that they questioned one of the Khajits that later on facilitated a lot the story plot thanks to these little fellas.

Thanks so much for doing these Matt! they help out heaps!

Tips: 1) Develop side plots for your characters 2) Develop extra NPCs for added depth 3) Keep cpmbat templates on stad by 4) Create unique traps and dangerous encounters 5) Generate fun items to reward your party 6) Create a complety immersive environment 7) Take notes

I threw my DM for a loop during the first session of our campaign by immediately splitting from the party, investigating a portion of the layout in the opposite direction from everyone else, and meeting an NPC we weren't supposed to encounter until much later in the campaign. It was my first experience with D&D, so I didn't know if I was being a bad player by going off book. But my DM loved the unexpected interactions, and he did an amazing job of adapting to my character's misadventures. So as a player, a flexible and creative DM is such a pleasure to work with, and those skills are so impressive and appreciated!

Man, Steve is a good guy, he always shows up when needed.

Thank you for making these, Matt!

thanks for the advice Matt, as always you have been a great teacher. I only started playing dnd 3 months ago and for my friends I imeadiatly became the DM. I have taken alot of my game running types after watching all 70 episodes of critical role. thanks for truly inspiring me to play!

keep them coming Matt. pure gold

absolutely love these GM tips. keep em coming GnS!:)

I don't usually make pre-written stories, because I find that improv is the *main* reason why my games are so lively and fun.

GM commentaries from past live campaigns that illustrate these DM tips would be awesome!

just got volunteered to be a gm for my first gm d&s game this video helped a lot by showing I'm mostly doing things right and a few helpful hints thanks so much

Thank you Thank You THANK YOU for making these! Keep 'em comin'!

Excellent little piece, thanks for creating it

Woo! My favourite series!

Sometimes, when I'm feeling sad. I just go through each GM tips video and listen to you say, "hello" 20 times in different ways.

In addition to notes, I always found keeping a post-session journal to be very useful. It can be fun for the players too, when it dawns on them that something small from several sessions earlier has just come back to bite them on the bum.

Great video, I'm happy these videos exist for new and experienced DMs to learn from. Would there be a video on running a Theatre of the Mind game in the future?

This is a great series. Thanks Matt. GM is not in my wheelhouse but I appreciate the perspective.

In my first campaign we took the party to a city that we were only supposed to be there for 1 or 2 sessions just for intel but our DM rolled on a table of random npcs and we took the information given and started a rebellion. It turned into a 6 session part of the campaign that was AMAZING!!

I had an improved Steve in my campaign once, he was a caravan guard sent to pick up the PC's at one point. Steve ended up having information about them and it lead to a character getting a cursed cloak as punishment for stealing from the king. The one character's hatred eventually bled into everyone else, and after a little while everyone hated Steve for some unknown reason. Steve went from being a lowly guard for the king, to a sort of high guard, to being the puppet master behind the upcoming war because my PC's despised him so much that they would curse him at every set-back or blame him for any villainous enemies that showed up.

i love matt mercer's tips so much!!

back for another lesson refresher. thanks again.

A list of names is my best advice for improv, coming up with good names on the fly can be really hard.

Literally my best adventure quest I did as a GM (or DM) was full of a bunch of improv that I came up with on the spot with little summaries of ideas I had before I started. I'm tell you guys once you find your own style as a GM things are going to be a lot more fun.

I am a keeper in call of Cthulhu and this series works for that game as well thanks

Thank you Matt! You inspire me to become better!

If you mess up, you say something blatantly untrue, and it's from an unimportant character, have them say something like "So then, you've figured me out? WELL I'LL HAVE THE LAST LAUGH." Then 'As you watch, the farmer's face becomes hideously disfigured, and the illusion is broken, before you stands a man clad in dark robes, with a necromancer's sigil on the hood, his laughter is thunderous, nearly maddening as he raises his hands, and says "RISE MY FRIENDS, SHOW THESE DELIGHTFULLY FOOLISH ADVENTURES HOW WE TREAT THEIR MEDDLING KIND!", as his hands reach into the air at the apex of his motions, a dark light emanates from them.' Then have undead begin rising out of the ground, powerful undead, ones that that (for a presumably low level party) they know they're booking their asses out. Have them make an escape, fleeing the evil undead necromancer. After 24 hours, if they head back, the sky is no longer dark and gloomy, the farmer is tilling the fields as before, and no sign of the undead. Then have him repeat exactly what he said the last time. As long as they're not me, they won't stop to question the plot or your slip-up.

I've been told that I'm generally pretty good at improv, helpful since I generally only set out very basic guidelines for my campaigns and then make the rest up as I go, unless it's something really story important, even then I leave it open enough that there's room for change when necessary

Matt's my hero. Wicked jealous of the voices. Super inspired by the work!

Prepared chaos. *is* a really good description of DMing. I generally prepare in a modular fashion and just set up a basic scenario at the beginning of a session or game. Most of what I end up doing is improvisation and taking notes on it to maintain continuity. I write up regions/groups as sort of generic personalities, from which I deviate when making NPCs on the fly. (They, of course, go into the notes)

I see you, Thordak... taunting us!

No one: Nobody: Not a single soul: Matt Mercer at 3 AM outside my window: "TAKE NOTES!"

I find it helpful to stop and really think bout the setting. If it's say, a small farming village, what are the crops, what else do people do there, when is church what are you wearing to the town dance and sociable? These answers make flying by the seat of my pants a lot easier.

Great series. Thanks Matt!

I swear my computer is sentient, the video refreshed at 0:10, it was way too perfect to be coincidence

I have to say after watching all these tips and guides I feel more sure on taking on the GM role. That and my friends have been nagging me to do so. And after writing up 31 pages of a module I know they will do their best to break it...as soon as possible! Because it's what we do,. And thanks to taking all these tips and tucking them into my back pocket I am happy to tell them to bring it on! Now onward to my first attempt at GMing...wish me luck! And thanks for all the great content and information.

This is super deep and helpful info, but also overwhelming since I've not done anything beyond a practice session with my wife. Matthew Colliver's "Running the Game" seems better for beginners, whereas Matt Mercer's GM Tips seems like next level advice once you've got a couple of campaigns under your belt. Either way, I'm looking forward to that stage.

He is such a great GM and voice actor.

We've done a few sessions now. I haven't been taking very good notes. My planning sesh last night was much more difficult than it needed to be. I'm gonna start taking notes.

ah yes my favorite segment.. matthew mercer's gmmmmm tips

As always, thank you Matt Mercer! You are a massive inspiration to us all.

Honestly, the biggest help I ever had in learning to improvise was in running a game called Beyond the Wall - a game designed to be played with literally no preparation.