Stop Playing D&D 

Davvy: D&D doesn't, doesn't count...

your profile pic goes well with your comment

no Davvy Chappy is a controlled operative peddling deception

Welcome to the Crapguide to [insert systemname here] today we are gonna talk about [insert thing here]

Woah, hey jocat

Lies

It's not a secret the coast would tell you.

he should have said everyfan of warhammer *40k* wont shut up. they the obnoxious ones.

Mainly play dnd and dm for my group but I've read some of the books my old roommate for warhammer 40k. Never started the game he planned. But it was pretty interesting and wouldn't mind playing it.

@@KatsuhiroHebi every fanboy/fangirl never shuts up* it just so happens WH as a whole is cursed with being just small enough but just good enough to attract those kinds of fans

For the Emperor!

I was worried you had fallen, brother.

Jokes on you, I've never played!

The secret is to either get in contact with someone, anyone, who has DM experience and either ask to join in for a session or ask them to do a one shot with you and a couple friends (I'm always accommodating with new players since I know so many people who don't get to play, online D&D is a thing if quarantine is an issue). Thereafter a session or two you'll know the basics of how to use a character sheet, there's tons of youtube channels to learn how to make one and thereafter you could take the plunge and DM yourself!!! For reference one of my player became a better DM than me over the short term, I think I've improved a lot since then so don't know how we compare today but we certainly are very different in style. Its a steep learning curve but if you work hard then it can be extremely rewarding, the story can simply be "you enter a bar, some thugs approach you and are vying for a fight, roll initiative". if you're ever worried about if DM'ing is boring just know, rn at least for me I find DM'ing more fun than playing, it comes a lot from my interest in writing but also from the fact that I work with my players collaboratively as much as possible to make it fun for everyone, playing a murder hobo campaign can be the most fun thing but sometimes people like being the good guys. Regardless the best thing you can do is start, anything, don't care about the quality, I cringe about my first campaign all the time, but it was fun! If its fun then that's a success!

@Izaak Cabacungan Funny since my group are all DM's, we take turns playing and DM'ing so there's never a forever DM!!!!

@Izaak Cabacungan Oof that doesn't sound too fun tbh, like being the DM is awesome but having the chance of being both player and DM is awesome. Have you asked your players if they'd want to run a one shot? (Not sure what type of players you have but if possible it's nice to have a player that can DM for a while to give you time to rest and prepare for the next game). Also ya it's pretty cool, I myself prefer DM'ing to playing (even though I was originally a player in my DM's game), also is cool to see what wild ideas the others have when they run a session or two.

*cries in L5R which I learned almost a decade ago and have taught to a not insignificant number of people with the sole intention of playing it one day and I have only ever DMd it"

HAHA did the same thing

Skulls for the skull throne brotha

*defeated* for the prince of pleasure..

*unzips pants* Magnus did nothing wrong

skulls for the... whatever...

Unhappy tyranid noises

I feel called out. Anyways, when's that new codex coming out, or did I miss the release?

a brother of a Warhammer fan. y e s

Warhammer.....the CrossFit of the TTRPG world

I find your lack of faith in Warhammer disappointing, how do you plead to this heresy?

there's also a new RPG and its awesome

Yer tearing me APART, Davvy! I fed up wit did game worlt!

clickbait

Yes, the floor here is made of the ceiling

*visible confusion*

i suspect they were high on narcotics -lord adorable

Its a stagnant joke for a stagnant empire. Its an inside joke!

You've just summed up all of my controversial videos.

I get why you say click bait but it’s definitely not. The title is the thesis of the video.

@@Feddzzz If you chop off half of it sure. The thesis of the video is that you should try games other than DND, which is very different from "Stop playing DND". Our beloved Dave Chap also directly says that hes not trying to get us to stop playing DND, just try other systems. That's what clickbait generally is, and i have no problem with it, since there is actually something good being said here.

My 3000 points of Blood Angels agree.

@@DavvyChappy Played against some sons of Sanguinius recently. Got my ass handed to me.

@@DavvyChappy My, er... 50 Power Sisters of Battle half agree, most of the time I don't talk to ANYONE, so I can't talk to them about Warhammer. ...I'm so lonely.

@@ErikWarhammer would you like a hug, friend?

Isn't it "RESENT" not resemble?

Bad systems make me happy.

@@DavvyChappy Which is the worst system and why is it FATAL?

@@drweegee1337Clearly you haven’t heard of Racial Holy War, which somehow manages to be, if not worse, than at least as bad as FATAL.

@@drweegee1337 My favorite bad system is actually V.T.N.L. If you have rules dedicated to *the exact way in which you are allowed to roll dice*, you have done something right.

@@DavvyChappy everyone in my party rolled dice with different flair for like the first year, until we realized that it took way too long.

Seriously try a new game. I spent 6 months making a homebrew sci-fi setting for 5e and just nothing was working. 5e is built around physical combat so laser guns and firing mechanics just are not fleshed out enough.

@@kid14346 i think there is a ttrpg called star finder

@@sc12346 StarFinder sucks. As does PathFinder. PF 2e is salvagable...almost. If you want space/sci-fi try Orbital 2100(for exploration), TimeWatch(for fun timeline stuff), or Alien(for TPKs).

WWII game. Maybe try Night Witches. It isn't horror but it is WWII. It is really good, and tugs at your heart strings because it is about a real unit of pilots.

@@kid14346 I had a friend try to develop a game that was basically a Cyberpunk setting with fantasy elements added in, turns out Shadowrun was actually a pretty good fit for that, even if the rules are a little janky and hard to follow at times.

Do you dm it or are you a player? I search a dm so badly

Me 100% ready to run a game of courtesans for whoever asks... Maybe someday someone will ask.

@@julius1724 i need a dm for castle and crusade soo

@@Roman-fg4nf "Keeper" is the Call of Cthulhu term for the Game Master role. A couple other games later borrowed it. A few other terms you might find are "Storyteller" (White Wolf/World of Darkness games), "Loremaster" (some LotR RPGs, and a few other games), "Master of Ceremonies/ MC" (Apocalypse World, and then some games derived from it [Powered by the Apocalypse games]), "Referee" (a lot of games, especially back when TTRPGs were still differentiating themselves from Wargames, but it's still used today in a lot of games that are not too wargamey), and, of course, "Dungeon Master" (yes, this is a proprietary term that is specifically attached to D&D. The fact that it's the default term just shows how much D&D dominates the hobby, huh) Each of them is meant to evoke a specific feel, or to give the idea of what type of role the GM is meant to play. "Storyteller" is meant to denote that those games were meant to be used to tell a story, rather than to just have a bunch of dudes kicking down doors in a dungeon (i.e. defining themselves in opposition to D&D), Lorekeeper is similar, saying that they are meant to be telling the lore of this world the players were in. MC says that these games are more collaborative, and the GM is meant to be there to keep things on track, to make sure that the events are running on time, to send in the monsters when they are needed, etc.. "Referee" means that they are there to make rulings where the players come into conflict or come into conflict with the rules (again with wargaming) or that they are meant to take a backseat unless needed. DM is denoting that the DM is first and foremost creating and controlling a dungeon that the players are fighting through/against Game Master is the default/unbranded term, generally, when there isn't a specific term that a system wants to use.

@@dartwada what a shame, i tought i finally found the one

LOL

_it's reason then..._

Maybe you should just present the rules of a different system as if they're your D&D homebrew?

Homebrewed until its unrecognizable *glances at my 3 notebooks of me turning the 5e system into an action points based classless semi-lethal cyberpunk system* yeahhh, totally haven't done that before

I'm homebrewing 5E to be the exact same game but with all the classes, subclasses, and feats rebalanced, with an emphasis keeping the original spirit of the default features and flavor text blurbs intact.

@@InviWasTaken soo, you want shadowrun

Sounds about right

Oh have no fear, Wizards of the Woke are here to help you keep playing D&D. But you can only play non-binary, genderfluid, non-humans. WAT

@@jasonmabry8526 If I wanted to hear your one-man show about how you're the most boring human alive, I'd ask your guidance counselor for free tickets.

@@Kane_the_Newschool_DM He says, after making a comment with one of the most overused memes ever, forever oblivious to the irony.

@@Cadaveralien This guy's on the internet using memes! Folks, lemme tell you,

@@jasonmabry8526 the fuck are you talking about?

Good ork impression

@@ryanstout8634 Ey hummie git me a fungus beer.

@@NF-nv3xw human form splits apart revealing a leaping Genestealer

@@ryanstout8634 Zog off bug! I aint runnin, i jus wanna liv to fight anoda day! :D

WAAAGH!

more like any here between 9 to 11 thousand years but okay

Sorry, I don't have hundreds to spend of minifigs

@@tempestgaming1600 Unlock the secret game mode playing online through the many sites that let you instead of not eating for a year to play

@@bashamd96 but at that point you're just playing XCOM

@@tempestgaming1600 But Xcom is fun so why not

Felt that on PbtA.

When your hobby makes you want to play a character who plays your hobby (I have wanted to play a pack of garou/sabbat who was a DnD group for a while).

But that's not clickbaity enough. 🐸☕

Accuracy isn’t essential. If you watch the video you understand, you don’t need a better title

I mean I'm not attacking anyone for using a misleading, intentionally inflammatory title in order to get more views on a video, but claiming that accuracy isn't essential is kind of silly. The title is accurate, but it is intentionally worded in a way to be controversial in order to garner attention and bait people to click on it, thus it is click bait. 😌

@@DeeDeeRAWR69 ☺️

That's not much clickbaity of you

That's genius...

While I won't tell you to use a different system (especially since changing systems is always a pain), I'll definitely point out to future people reading this that there're a couple of fairly good fanmade Pokemon tabletop systems out there. Personally, I prefer United over Adventures, but both are fairly solid options. That said. How is Mutants & Masterminds? I built a character for it, once, but the GM ended up dropping the game after one session.

@@Vgy1592 I consider it very flexible. There's a lot of addons to it, but the other books are mostly just tips on how to run different genres using the same ruleset. I have the base stuff, as well as Mecha & Manga (for anime stuff), Warriors & Warlocks (to return to more fantasy elements), and the Supernatural Handbook (for gritty or gothic horror). We chose Mutants & Masterminds because - for a game where you play as the Pokemon themselves instead of the trainer, superhero rules work. I would, however, consider the lack of actual published modules (or even much third party/homebrewed modules) for the game to be a detriment, however. Mutants and Masterminds mostly works for "open ended" DMing styles. After the characters are actually made, the system is... rules-light. There's a lot of "that didn't succeed, would you like to describe how?" and "that succeeds, go ahead and tell us how you did it" to it. It's great for folks who can do things on the fly, and make stuff up as they go along.

This is such a big brain idea

LET ME IN! LET ME IIIIIIIN!

No they're not! They're *Fancy* DnD and *Hipster* DnD respectively! /s

@@xionkuriyama5697 Palladium's stuff is hipster DnD?

@@jeremiahlewis410 I've certainly never considered Palladium to be hip. It has more of a tinfoil hat wearing warning you about the trilateral commission vibe. Tekumel would be my choice for hipster D&D.

What about starfinder. That's totally not just....space DND right ...right?

@@eriktyrrell424 sometimes you gotta warn people about the trilateral commission tho lol

Fine, Spelljammer or Starfinder it is.

@@commandercaptain4664 But . . . but those aren't Dungeons and Dragons!

@@HoundofOdin ECH, FINE! Dungeons & Lazers, then! *... waits for it...*

@@commandercaptain4664 *BUT THAT'S NOT DUNGEONS AND DRAGONS!* 😭😭😭😭

Or play EDGE OF THE EMPIRE

Yes

@@DavvyChappy No.

@@DavvyChappy no

@@DavvyChappy no

@@arloracc Yes.

There are tons of Warhammer roleplaying games, honestly. From fantasy battles to like 6 flavours of 40k, depending on what you pick to play as.

So, it might be a good time to recommend the Deathwatch RPG, if for no other reason than it goes over every single implant a Space Marine has in painstaking detail. Also, it has a quote by Rogal Dorn that supposedly came from the 41st millennium, so there's that

@@benkaes3657 I've played Deathwatch for four years but honestly those implants are not that prominent?

@@JoseLopez-bq2lq Sounds like Paranoia 2.0 😁

what's a " *T* RPG"?

There's no hype for it at all, I just really hope that the video games success leads into the TTRPGs success.

I'm definitely waiting for it. Cyberpunk 2020 was fun

@@acrylicghost125 It's already out

@@negative6442 oohh. I thought on Miniature Market it was for pre-order. I will look again, thank you

Not new, a new edition. RTal's Cyberpunk goes back to the 80s. :)

Oof, I've had that before. I was forced to learn new systems all through high school because I only had one group that played fast and loose with their campaigns.

So an more extreme version of Always having gimmicy campaign ideas with lots of homebrew?

@@defensivekobra3873 Yes. I've learned, Gurps, Starfinder, Pathfinder, Ghostbusters, Vampire the Masquerade, homebrewed 5e where magic is super hard, 5e with a bunch of house rules to nerf leveling and nerf long rests, whole new lore for multiple worlds while learning new systems. And now all my groups (even the three currently 5e games) want to do Shadow of the Demon Lord and Into the Deadlands. I've pulled out of the Demon Lord group. I have three remaining games. One of the three remaining 5e games is the DM who is running Deadlands afterward even though the 5e group we have is incredible. They're great characters that could make for a wonderful long term adventuring group. Like Critical Role levels of great. The second wants to run a shallow monster of the week, no real rp game. And third is just starting but it's having a hard time finding time to play. It's like I missed the zeitgeist for 5e and everything is shallow experiments. I just want to meet a group in a tavern and go on fantasy adventures.

@@DavvyChappy It started small, 5e with homebrew. A world where casting had to pass a DC based on location to even happen then your regular rolls. No one played a caster. Then it began to be like the group you mentioned. There was still plenty to play. When it got to the point of all new systems, I tried. Then I went online to find a group for 5e. And those are doing the same thing. I feel a bit like I missed out.

@@DavvyChappy Still in that group myself, but they are lifelong friends, so c'est la vie.

Blood for the Blood God! Skulls for the Skull Throne!

Milk? Why not recaf an lho sticks?

So _that_ is where "blood for the blood god" comes from

@@defensivekobra3873 Blood for the blood god comes from a lot of places, the question is which did it first

Like the aztecian Blood God, that 'required' frequent sacrifices, to ensure the sun rose each morning.

I love geist and changeling so much. But alas I have never gotten a group that will actually play a white wolf game with me. There are so many good syatems out there though, and D&D is so generic, anyone who never plays another system does themselves a disservice.

Fantasy Flight Games made a Star Wars RPG that I'm playing right now. Has an incredibly intuitive narrative-driven dice system. Another one they did, with that same system, is called GENESYS. Has a guide for making your own setting and characters. It's been used for games such as Android, Realms of Terrinoth, and Keyforge. Also, maybe Twilight Imperium, but I have no full confirmation.

@@B3nKen0bi yea so many games have great ideas for world building and character creation. We recently played Monster of the Week, and that’s helped with our party design for DnD

@@gasol18 looks interesting. I'll have to look into it.

@@B3nKen0bi FFG's Star Wars RPG is SO good. It's such an interesting idea, and they have tons of expansion content too. Shame more of it isn't available online...

What's it like nowadays? I played back in the 90's, but then things went strange.

I know right !! I adore white wolf

Remember Kindred, it is the blood of Caine that drfives your fate.

@Patrick Janecke VTM V5 (the newest version) recieved... mixed reviews and a lot of people from what I understand play the V20 version that came out a while ago. Cant really say anything about the other WoD games

Trying new things is intimidating. That's what I hope to help with in the future.

Ive heard mutants and masterminds is good. Ive never gotten the chance to play it but it seems interesting.

@@joonapukarinen1153 it is quite a lot of fun, bit crunchy but you can pull off some crazy stuff.

Try "Pulp Cthulhu" it's a different version of the game with hardier PC's.

Seconding Mutants and Masterminds. The core rules are free at d20heroes. It's crunchy, particularly in character creation, but actual gameplay tends to be a lot smoother and freeform, and as a GM generating NPCs is surprisingly easy due to descriptors and power levels. Plus, the combat it wonderfully encapsulates the feeling of superheroes performing magnificent feats, and allows Batman and Superman to both meaningfully fight in the same combat. Highly recommended if you want a superhero rpg. (For first time players, you should probably choose on of the premade archetypes. Also, the Power Profiles are not needed, but very highly recommended for how to make your own superpowers.)

its not a flaw yo only like fantasy, its just a prefrence

100%. I'm still going to talk about D&D, I just want to get used to talking about other things.

@@DavvyChappy i would love to learn about other games

@@DavvyChappy i believe if you talk about other games, then Im sure they will get more attention.

@@DavvyChappy Good. That is very good

@@DavvyChappy i'd love for maybe so reviews on other systems. Do you happen to know of another system that's high magic fantasy, but is light on the math? Math has always been the biggest turn away for me from other systems.

"Drink ass" That's next level scat right there.

I can barely play DnD 'cause I can't get people to play and I've had a hard time finding a group online

@@JhuanVSales Getting a group together can be hard but stick it out, sure my current campaign has 4 players and my friend's has 3. Heck even my 2nd campaign had 2 players. The number of players doesn't matter the fun that's had along the way does. If you're a player and not a DM then I'd recommend trying DM'ing for a while, you can get people interested in the hobby and then in turn they might end up DM'ing you.

Like interesting dice mechanics ehh? well check out Through the Breach. its not dice ran its Card ran and its super interesting

Dice Mechanics in VTM is like Jazz music. You’ve read about them over and over again, but when it comes to playing it, you don’t know what the fuck is happening. You’re not supposed to. That’s the ✨magic✨ of it all. In all seriousness though, yeah, VTM has super interesting dice mechanics lol. They really do just be kinda funky. Especially 20th anniversary edition.

@@righteousgames7107 Yes, old WoD had cool dice mechanics. It;s rather sad they just decided to get rid of difficulty in VtM5.

@@righteousgames7107 I haven’t played VtM but one of my favourite styles of resolution is the D6 dice pool used by Shadowrun. It really makes every skill point you put in something feel like it matters since the larger your dice pool is the lower your glitch chance is.

Yes. Yes we do.

I always wanted to try that

Always wanted to try out that system, seems real fun but World of Darkness is my main right now so-

I wanted to try it so badly I even have a character sheet but our dm showed up for three sessions then quit

@@brinashiloff3439 damn dude, how come they quit?

That's the point :P

As someone who played a role in the growth of White Wolf and watched people jump ship from writing for white wolf to developing 5th Edition D&D, they not only stood a chance but they handed Wizards the market on a silver platter. In the mid-90's White Wolf was nearly in the position D&D is now and Wizards of the Coast was operating out of a dude's Garage in a Seattle suburb. White Wolf couldn't come up with a follow-up for the World of Darkness that worked and kept leveraging their brand with new editions of the game. Meanwhile they took advantage of their fanbase and degraded them. By the time D20 Open License hit White Wolf just didn't have enough strength to hold their share, the right's holders jumped with their golden parachutes and the suckers who were left holding the bag watched all of their talent interview for jobs at Wizards of the Coast.

They need their own Critical Role, or at least an animated series explaining the CoD mythos.

@@commandercaptain4664 There's been some pro-streams of Vampire before. In fact I think Critical Role did a Vampire one shot at some point.

@@michaelwolf8690 I’m an early 2000’s kid by the time I started playing white wolf woc was dominant

@@rustlegion4283 You missed an era by maybe 4 years where you couldn't find a store that still carried D&D books and there were gaming stores that didn't have any non-white wolf product.

Monster of the Week is one of the most fun games to run and play. It's versatile and has a good balance of crunch (rules heaviness and stats) vs freedom to roleplay. Very inexpensive too! One book has the rules, player options, and ideas of how to run the game for like $25USD Fate was too loose, my in-person playgroups wouldn't roleplay enough to get that going. Pathfinder was too crunchy and nobody wanted to read that much. (I have since gotten to enjoy Pathfinder 2e, just took an adjustment period.) Call of Cthulhu has its place too. Monster of the Week has easy to understand rules that give power to players and let the GM build a reactive atmosphere that tells the story the group most wants to tell together. The players have a distinct goal (beat monster) but are given freedom to figure out how to get there. And of course, The Adventure Zone is a great way to get into it. Amnesty Arc for those interested. It's a small town of normal folks where monsters are popping up, but our heroes have been keeping the atrocities at bay until something more sinister threatens them.

I also like PTU, but having potentially 7 character sheets is a bad game design idea. I was going to start a game once and I had to use so many automation tools just to prep that I realized it wouldn't be fun to keep playing into the future.

Yeah o specially agree with pathfinder 2e it manages to be streamlined and balanced without being overly complicated, how they fixed problems 5e dealt with, like ping pong healing? Wounded condition. Make martials feel interesting? Give them interesting options and make them feel just like demigods at higher levels. Prepared casters are just straight better Tha learned casters? Let's reincarnate true vancian magic and fix the spell balance and simplify spell lists while at it. Don't want to be forced to choose power and flavor? Don't worry, we have skill feats, ancestry feats, general feats and class feats and you don't choose one over the other. Multiclassing is broken and missing prestige classes? Dedication feats got you covered. Broken encounter design? Pffffffft, we fixed that so hard, you can accidentally TPK the party if you use something too above the party level, and the Tarrasque can TPK level 20 parties too. The only weakness is that Pathfinder 2e is a so well oiled machine that without official guidelines, you cannot be too careful homebrewing, because the math is so tight you can break it with a +2 modifier given way too early.

Now all I need is money. *Opens wallet, a cartoonish moth flies out*

This isn't even true, though--the rules of D&D are very complex compared to many systems, leading to things like the Sage Advice Column which is *dedicated* to settling long standing disputes over extremely fiddly rules.

They really aren’t save for a handful of things. Such as starfinder for example VERY complex

As an example, how many rules do you need to have memorized to guide a new player trying to figure out the sneak attack rules? How about if they make a monk as the pre-publication UA minotaur and immediately ask if the charge attack means they can attack five times per round with Flurry of Blows? How about surprise rounds? How would you explain deciding surprise in the first round to a new DM? Is it a "surprise round" or what? How about the rules around that one spell? You know, the one your players always get wrong, which you always need to look up to clarify? What about obvious cheese uses of spells that, actually, yeah, would work? How about cheese builds? When is a +7 to attack and damage bonus at the same time on a low level character possible? How about a 35 AC? Is that a legal character, or just one you need to throw out because it's going to trivialize any combat encounters without plentiful saving throws? Can that sorclock gain more sorcerer spell slots than they normally have from short rests? How about conditions? Incapacitated means you can't take actions or reactions. What about bonus actions? What about free actions like speaking? Do you get to resist grapples while incapacitated, or resist spells with your saving throw? What about if you're stunned? Does that inflict the same kind of disadvantages, or is it a totally distinct condition? If someone is invisible and sneaks up on your PC, how do you process the perception to detect them? Is it an opposed check or passive perception, and if it's passive perception how do you calculate disadvantage into a passive check? If you stay up for a week straight, do you automatically take exhaustion or do you make a series of con saves? How about turn order? Are actions in a 6 second time period sequential or do they happen concurrently? How about darkness? Do you get disadvantage on your attack roll or what? I know all the answers here, but these are all rules and situations people get confused on regularly. Well-known DMs on live streams regularly screw up rulings for D&D 5e because the rules are fiddly, dude. They just are.

​@@d.parasol First, you shouldn't be using unofficial material for an example here. It'd be like bringing up your personal homebrew broken class as a point, just doesn't work. but i'll answer all the questions to show you just how few rules you actually need to memorize. 1) Flurry of blows works of a bonus action made after you make an attack. That answers the questions 2) "Are the people being attacked aware of the location of the attackers?" If not, they are surprised, treat surprise as a condition and not a round, biggest misruling i know of. 3) Unless you have a specific spell in mind, make a ruling about it, record the ruling and stick with it. If a spell can be "cheesed" so what? people learn quick when their lives re threatened so maybe have a way around it 4) If cheese builds can be done RAW, what even is your point here? Thing about those builds, is that they have niches, some larger than others. yeah your 35AC build can't be hit, but make a dex save, nerd. you got a +7 to hit and damage? try attacking a trap or deal with archers. 5) Read the conditions, it seems like most of your "complexities" can be solved by reading the material. 6) Invisible is a condition, go to the conditions section and read what it does, it isn't very long or complicated. advantage and disadvantage on passives are + or - 5 depending. Passive scores is your passive observation, perception checks are when you are actively looking. 7) If you stay up for a week straight you die. Exhaustion is a condition, go read it. Also look at the resting rules, it clearly states it. Are all your issues coming from not actually reading the material? 8) Oh wow, there's a section in the book about turns and rounds in combat that literally answers this question. 9) Go look at vision, it's in its own handy little section that explains it Sure maybe someone gets a ruling wrong due to conflicting editions. But here's the thing, it takes 10 seconds to look up a rule and if you know something's gonna come up, check the rules. You don't need to know the answer to most of your questions on a random session.

I clearly noted that I *know* all the answers to the questions I posed--it's the fact that *any* of these questions that can be asked at all which is my point, and which you've clearly ignored entirely. Your answer is literally and only saying, "Damn, guess you didn't read and memorize the 300 page Player's Handbook, that sounds like a 'you' problem, and certainly not a 'why does this system require mastery of a 300 page book to run smoothly?' problem." Your comment is nearly a non-sequitur because it fails to address my intent in bringing up these examples. Several of the situations I mentioned above can require looking up more than one thing, of course--for instance, if I’m a new player playing a monk, and I use stunning strike for the first time, I need to then look at stunning strike, note that this imposes the stunned condition, move to the conditions in the back and check the stunned condition, note that stunned condition also includes incapacitated condition. At that point, if I have a DM who is also new in any respect, I tell him his monster is stunned, and that means he can’t take actions or reactions--the DM is understandably not entirely certain what that means. The condition mentions actions and reactions, and says nothing whatever about *free actions*, which is one thing I mentioned specifically. Can the stunned creature manipulate an object in any way? Can they continue holding a precious and fragile item, for instance? The section on conditions does not perfectly clarify this point for us--it states that the stunned character cannot move, but doesn’t clarify whether this means move parts of its body or whether this refers to the move mechanic. At least p. 189 of the PHB clears up that *bonus actions* are also out whenever actions are out, which until this point in referencing the book could have been unclear. At any rate, that’s no less than 4 stops in the book, assuming I check the right part of the book the first time every time, for imperfect knowledge about the precise mechanical effects of the action I’ve taken. Even the precise mechanical effect of Incapacitated is fiddly in a very particular sense--in that it doesn’t make sense, and someone who can’t recall the precise wording of incapacitated could conceivably suppose that incapacitated stops the character from moving, even though mechanically they can move up to their full speed while affected by this condition. (I’ve had multiple DMs over the past 6 years screw up on this point and rule that incapacitated restricts movement or speech as well, and I’ve had multiple players assume that it restricts the very same things.) I'll note some other things that you took exception to--no unofficial material, for instance. It's just a fact that WotC puts out Unearthed Arcana and that people play UA. Should I not mention something which is demonstrably a part of so many tables? Wittgenstein said meaning is use, so I say use is the game. As for spells, let’s think about a classic head-scratcher: Time Stop. Jeremy Crawford himself gave two divergent rulings on this spell (would cutting a bridge, for instance, end the effect or not? Crawford ruled both ways at different times), reflecting the fact that the spell description itself is not suficient to determine what exactly the spell does mechanically. It has been noted that from a strictly RAW standpoint, when two characters are in darkness, they both have the blinded condition, and therefore both have disadvantage on attacks against others and others have advantage on attacks against them. RAW, therefore, the two parties just continue rolling attacks as normal. Like incapacitated, this *makes no sense at all*, and a common home rule is to make both parties attack at a disadvantage. I’ll note also that you’re again missing the point on the question about turns and rounds--this is a regular question I’ve received from multiple players, and it’s the fact that so many players ask about this that you’re missing out on. I mean, the Sage Advice Compendium is 20 pages of extremely common rules questions. It’s fiddly. Is it as fiddly as, say, 3.5? No, not really. But to say it’s overwhelmingly simplistic and that the clear and unambiguous answer is that anyone who has even a moment of confusion just needs to reread a 300 page book? That’s hilariously wrongheaded. I run a CoC game and the only rules questions I get after about 3 sessions with a player is “does this skill apply here?” I run a Savage Worlds game and the only questions I get are about getting the drop and healing, in addition to questions about whether a skill applies in a particular situation. Hey, I get it--I used to be in the “D&D 5e is a rules-lite game!” camp. But a rules-lite game is Mothership RPG, which has combat rules which fit on 2 pages, death/dying rules that fit on 1 page. Lasers and Feelings is a game fitting entirely on one single page. A Paizo-ian monstrosity 5e is not, but to call any game that requires semi-regular book reference simple misunderstands what a simple and rules-lite game actually is.

"I see someone never had a DM who took every opportunity to murder players. " man, I had this sort of DM, the kind that just likes to fuck over their players whenever possible. I really don't understand where these people come from: if you hate us all, why are you running this game for us? it's really toxic and makes you hate your DM

@@slkjvlkfsvnlsdfhgdght5447 Yeah, nothing like spending hours making a character and getting excited to play them only to take a wrong turn in a cavern and die to a mind flayer😭

@@jodyb1095 never had it this extreme, but I can totally buy it

FATAL episode when?

Agreed.

But that game demands you answer a very important question. How do you like your 90's? Dark punk, dayglow radical, or Saturday morning cartoon. Also we are talking about a game where the book of items starts with a rape story.

Ps dead lands

Or Mage the Ascension, if you want to get really weird.

@@FelineElaj mage the ascension is when you wanna fry your own brain

It is one of my favorite systems. There is so much you can do if you are creative.

@@snowmexican8558 Hell yeah

Time wizards is one of my favorite 1-shot games.

Yeah, it really gets passed over.

Icons plays better than M&M.

@@RPGzus I prefer the wild creations and possibilities of M&M. Icons just seems too......simplified? I guess?

Hell yeah M&M is awesome! I GMd a villains game that lasted 4 years. The only thing that I had to homebrew was a level progression system. It really sucks that it lacks one.

I'd say it's more like chocolate chip. It's got a bit of spice thrown in the chocolate chips so it's not just generic everysystem, but it's pretty minimal. It still goes good with many things.

Whats your favorite game to play then? Mines a toss up between Mage: The Ascension or Mutants and Masterminds. Both let you be super creative.

Press F for Smooth Boy Chappy...

Creo Herbam is surprisingly useful, if your SG rules that the accelerated growth spells aren't inherently rituals.

Ars Magica rocks!

@@PL-zm7pp No, that's Terram...

Call of Cthulu has been the main RPG I have been playing. (Although my party style is closer to pulp) It really teaches you to think differently about solving issues. D&D you fight the monsters. In COC on our last mission we used gorilla warfare tactics and investigated the creatures.

If you like Call of Cthuhu, Delta Green is very similar, but can work beyond one shots.

@@tzaphkielconficturus7136 Which one is Delta green? COC can work beyond one shots. Although our party is very lucky and our keeper is kind so we have some I guess homebrew to make it less one shot

@@evandugas7888 1d4chan.org/wiki/Delta_Green Yeah, CoC can do longer campaigns, but it's much harder to make work, especially with the usual assumption that the investigators are just people who run into the supernatural thing, and go deal with it, then either die or go the rest of their lives trying to forget.

You're like me then. My first ttrpg was A Song of Ice and Fire RPG in 2015, then Pendragon, Mage the Ascension, Werewolf the Apocalypes, Mutants and Masterminds, Spycraft, Star Wars Edge of the Empire, Monster of the Week, and very briefly D&D 3.5. I ran The One Ring for a 2 year campaign with over a dozen players off and on, and while doing that I found Davy and all the other amazing youtube resources for DMs. Through their videos I learned 5e and started DMing that. I have still never been a player in 5e. *Edit:* I can't believe I forgot Werewolf!

@@saltypork101 Werewolf was awesome! Yeah your experience sounds a lot like mine. I really love all the systems and they are better for the games they are for. I tried running Mutants and Masterminds as a fantasy game for new players cuz it was easier then Pathfinder but didn't work that well as a conversion.

I think there's also a warrior cats rpg

Lancer if you want something more anime-flavored, Battletech if you want something more western. (Mind you, I'm certain there's tons of other systems. I just don't know them myself.)

And Palladium's stuff, and Shadowrun and WoD, especially Mage.

GURPS Corebooks + GURPS Ice Age + GURPS Dinosaurs = your dream come true.

I'd like to propose one reason to still try other systems, maybe not run them but perhaps play a game in them. You will come back to 5e with so many new ideas about how to do things differently. Even just reading the rules or ideas other systems have may help you tweak your game to make it even more the game you wan it to be. You wouldn't limit yourself to just one board game, tv show, or genre so why do the same for RPGs. How will you ever know what you might want in the future if you haven't tried it or know that it exists.

D&D is great. I am about to run my first 5E game but I love other genres then Fantasy. Cyberpunk, horror, superheros and so many more. Some systems are complicated but lots of them are really easy to get into.

@@nashwinston1395 I actually have ADHD so, because of hyperfixation, do usually only watch one show for great lengths of time. I’ve actually been creating my own ttrpg and through this have slowly gotten more and more aware of how restrictive and unnecessarily complicated DnD 5th edition is.

YEAH here's a mutants and masterminds buddy!

I'm the opposite with Starfinder. I like it, but my friend group dislikes the system of it. Pathfinder 2E I just have a hard time enjoying.

@@bretginn1419 Yeah 2E is a little weird to get into at first. But I feel you can make "your" character, truly customize them to a specific playstyle other then "Me go here me hit thing me run away" you can give definition to your character. Once you find a character mold, you can experiment with things. Combat and skill wise. Find a unique flow to what you do. Now some stuff is just outright silly and freaking "what?". But if you have a good storyteller and person who understands the system. Those things are barely noticeable. It's still a growing system so. Like D&D over the years things'll change over time. They recently released some rule revisions and clarifications.

Call of Cthulhu

How is it going? I want to run a Cyberpunk Red campaign for my friends

@@ellagage1256 I’m currently looking for players in my Cyberpunk Red game, it’s not going fantastically right now, looking for players is hard

@@izukurinnvarris7797 Oof sorry to hear that mate. Hopefully you'll find some players ☺

@@ellagage1256 good news I have a full party and our first session is on Saturday

@@izukurinnvarris7797 Aye awesome! I just got my third player a few hours ago

M&M is awesome. Did you homebrew a level progression system. I found I had to cuz there isn't one in the book.