Why would a player who normally plays in-person have to play remotely for a session? Could they not just get in their car and drive to where the game is to play in-person?

I think this is a tremendously helpful template! I will definitely be using this for more confidence in making sure i cover all the bases during a session 0. 😁

If you have been playing with your group for a long time, then having a S0 that focuses on the campaign, style, and characters makes sense. However when ppl complain about the garbage that goes on in their games, and are told that a good S0 could have solved a lot of that, it's not the campaign, style or characters that are the issue. It is the behaviors. A good S0 should be able to bring a bunch of ppl who don't know each other on board to play a game with few behavioural problems. It should be able to on-board a new player into and existing group. A S0 that does not focus on the behavior expectations above all the rest, is likely just a campaign pitch.

The maps that you have behind you are always amazing. Do you get them from a specific place or Patreon, or do you make them yourself?

DMs should conceive of the campaign/campaigns. The players choose which one they want and then each player should have a chance to “yes, and…” their ideas. Rarely the DM but “no, but…” any truly unworkable concepts

I have my session zero for the new campaign next week. Thanks for the tips!

I do most of this list in what I call the campaign briefing. It's a short document that describes the setting & premise of the campaign, themes, the length & even the rules and what kind of scheduling I expect to have. The actual session zero is usually fairly short, since only the players who were interested attend, with character creation and discussions on that. (IRL, I'd throw in the beginning of the adventure as well, but we often play online.)

Nice video. Personally I find players making characters individually can be problematic. The best parties I had, the characters were created together during session 0, and they "knew each other" before the game start.

About to start my new campaign in a week, this video was a good help for a session zero

I've never played dnd before but have been wanting to get into it more and more lately, I wanted to write a campaign and ended up here, this has given me a couple of ideas and I'm super excited to get started, thanks!

Cool ideas! But what do the players get for passing their exams? Proficiency in a related skill, language, or tool? Something else? What becomes of any unused learning points in excess of what they spend to buy additional exam dice? Do they carry over to the next term, can they be redeemed for something else, or are they just lost?

Loving your content! This came right in time for my return to DM'ing 5th edition next week and was reassuring to find your Session 0 list is pretty much the same as mine. Cheers!

My current campaign (a seafaring adventure) is about 10 sessions away from its end. Glad to have gotten this video to add to my collection of resources with the next campaign approaching. Session 0 is always the hardest part for me. I keep having topics come up mid-session that I realize, in hindsight, I should have covered in the beginning. Thanks for the help!

Literally have a session zero in 5 hours, thanks

Environment REALLY matters in D&D. The closest my party has ever come to a TPK involved the party of 7 characters, at around 8th level, being trapped in a small subterranean shrine with a Dire Troll and an Annis Hag. The hag ambushed them on the first turn, grappled the cleric and crushed her into unconsciousness, then piked her on one of the iron hooks around her chamber like she was playing dead by daylight. On initiative 20 the next turn, she schlorped through the walls with her lair action and let the Dire Troll out of its cage in the floor. The party now had this gigantic multi armed mincing machine right in their midst, with nowhere to run to get out of range of its attacks. A failed Athletics check to break the locked portcullis wasted a turn from the barbarian. The healer was failing death saves on a hook. The frantic party focused all their fire on the troll, locking it down with Entangle and Slow, but that just meant nobody was watching when the hag schlorped out of the walls again on turn 4, granny-hugged the fighter to 0 and piked her on a hook. They only survived because the Dire Troll wasted a turn flubbing a roll to break Entangle, and the wizard nailed it with a critical Firebolt the turn before it would have regained its Frenzy attack (unaffected by Slow) and wiped the entire party in one move. The party had easily defeated the hag and a large horde of ogres and goblins before in a straight siege fight where they controlled the battlefield, so they went in cocky. This time, she was ready for them, and nearly TPK'd with only two monsters. In an open field, though, the party would have comfortably surrounded and whittled them down. Environment. Matters.

This is ultimately why I've committed to using Dungeon Blocks tiling system; I looked into a lot of other types of physical terrain but I don't just want to pretty up a flat map, I want the three dimensionality to matter tactically to the battles, because doing 3d terrain is an INVESTMENT. I have tried to do multi level, complex battlefields with my flat maps and to an extent it's worked, but I have a large party and some will always end up further from the map than others, where it's much harder for them to see what's going on. I'm hoping the elevated terrain will help with that.

Key session 0 rule for me is to make sure they start with a common reason for adventuring together. If everyone arrives with a separate and rigid character objective, it usually doesn't make sense for them to join together, and it's difficult for the GM to curate a cohesive story that addresses the players desires. Sometimes I give them the reason, like they each pick another player they're bonded to, or they all came from the same region, or there was some larger event that impacted them equally so they have a common motivation

Thank you for all the ideas!

What I like about this presentation is you frame it as the DM saying what he wants to do and the others players deciding whether or not that works for them and opting in or out. I've seen videos promoting Session Zero in the opposite direction, where the other players decide what kind of game they want to play and the DM being more or less obliged to provide it. While to some extent it goes both ways, of course, the decision about what kind of game you'll play should mostly lie with the DM, who after all has to spend a lot more time with it than everyone else. If the DM isn't playing a game he or she likes, nobody is going to have fun.

I'm starting my campaign in a month and wanted to see how i can introduce them to the campaign, it's a fallout style campaign and uses completely different mechanics, I'll keep this in mind once It begins, thanks a ton mate

I am about to start my new campaign in a post-apocalyptic, high fantasy dnd 5e game, that takes place after The Shadow Horde swept through the lands... could have used these tips for the session 0 I held two weeks ago xD Great advice as usual, so will keep them in mind for the next one, mate! :D

I'm really interested in the DC20 system Dungeon Coach is kickstarting right now. I love 5E but I'm kinda done with WOTC and their money grubbing ways, I want to support a company that cares about the game and treats me like a customer not a consumer. Great video!

You should buy this if you are brand new to D&D, or if you haven't already spent months or years perfecting 5e. From what I've seen so far, I will pass. I just looked at the Fighter changes. I've already tweaked and peaked it. For example, there are two fighters Jacked fighters who add their strength modifiers to their intimidation skill checks. And athletic fighters who get to reroll a athletic skill checks once a short rest. Once you choose at season zero you can't change. Additionally, you can use second wind to automatically pass a constitutional saving throw if you fail one during a chase. Also, if you are making a physical ability skill checks you can use it to automatically pass. Champion already had big improvements at my table. I don't need this PHB. What I do need is more campaign material with great maps. Sadly WoTC no longer makes great campaign books anymore.

Sweet, more Pathfinder Content! Always loved Earthfall, a short campaign set during that dark age of Earthfall would be so interesting

100% agree, its not very fun for the DM to fudge, but its also very unfun for the players to have to deal with a less engaging combat session because of poor prep or because I'm inexperienced in running combat as a DM. I recently allowed a bard player to give disadvantage to a dispacer beast's attack by using minor illusion as a reaction, conjuring a mirror image of their face, and ducking below as the beast struck this air. My lowest roll was a 16, and I want to encourage my players to think creatively like that, so I fudged the roll. I think it was a good decision, especially with them being a new player.

Judging by your two latest shorts, it seems the money you've not invested in the new DND books has been well used to buy the DM Core :D

I'm considering playing a gnoll. Nice timing 😊

Thank you for this, soon I will get the Knolls Epic Encounters 😎

Fun fact: this mythos is inspired by Kieth Parkinson’s famous illustration of the gnoll necromancer. I don’t remember which TSR publication it’s from though

thanks for the tips!

More pathfinder 2e content please! If you want to.

I'm still in the rookie year of DMing but I have a succubus that's been homebrewed I didn't mean to but when I set up a tournament, by the rolls of the dice a different reoccurring enemy (that almost TPKd them) was one shot and dead from the succubus They were all afraid of her and I realized I had something They DESPISE her and I love throwing her at them

Cool, that's sooo 70s 😎

Yeah Pathfinder content 🎉🥳🦄 the Golarion world/setting is so interesting

I designed my HB campaign around this exact premise!

I won’t buy them. I don’t like what they did to paladins and I don’t have a lot of disposable income

Nahhh I think if wotc doesnt significantly change how they operate or put out something undeniably amazing, I'm not gonna be doing business with them again

Our table just got familiarised and comfortable with 5e.. to be honest I think it will take us a while to go to 5.5. However we already start to talk about it, and just being excited and discussing it, but nothing too serious. I will be buying the new books nevertheless, because I'm just a sucker for nice illustrations, and I'd love to add them to my collection. But for the whole table to move on, I guess it will take a sweet while!

No

Another great video!

Hi, as a bossfight for a 1v1 what can a level 17 paladin kill in terms of CR? Can he kill 20/21 CR for example?

I like how it a real game, doesn’t feel over done with the social interactions and filler 👍🏽💯 really great to watch to learn for my own games

You said you wouldn't buy the books because it would be expensive but then mention that it would be available on dndbeyond....you still have to pay them for access to the digital version of the books unless i missed an announcement for these three

Damm bro this is my first time watching a video of yours but your voice is not at all what I expected you to sound like but it’s also really cool

No. You should get DC20.

But can I make my character a lich? Not the enemy but a character. My character willingly chose to become a lich. Is it possible? You know be a good lich? Hunt down criminals and bad people and take their souls. Sort of an antihero. But I never heard anyone make their character a lich. Is it possible?

I will certainly be buying the PBH asap but probably not the MM & DMG because I practically never use the DMG and make my own monsters and if I needed rules I can always reference my 2014 DMG or MM, or I can just google the book using online anyflip which I already do. I’m excited to see what the new character sheets look like even though I use dnd beyond for all my characters 😅. Congrats on the success with the channel recently ❤!!!

I honestly love everyone of your videos, and have probably watched them all several times. Such a huge help and ressource for a first time DM homebrowing a campaign. Thank you so much for your content. Its really great

I will buy them, but I don’t like what I hear. I think the weapon abilities will get old really fast, especially if they involve saving throws. An action surging fighter using these features 4 times in a turn will be annoying. The restriction on ability score distribution in backgrounds are stupid and a downgrade from Tasha’s. Humans with two feats will be the best choice again for species (and I am now forced to deal with the “skilled” feat which is often banned in my group of sometimes 6 players).

My group is pretty strongly 5e based so I’ll buy the book. We’ll give the PHB a fair shake with Vecna Eve of Ruin, then probably sculpt everything into the homebrew version of the game that works best for us.