Another note for NPC motivations: what I like to do and what keeps my NPC's characters and motivations very diverse is put my music on shuffle or go to a station and use the songs to describe the character. I've gotten such FANTASTIC characters this way because I'll say something like "Okay, this is the spokesperson for this town, they're a leader type, probably will be helpful to the party" then get a randomly dark song and suddenly I'm working it in how this spokesperson is actually covering up a plot where she's been bribing the local cult with people's lives to keep the rest of the town safe which is so much deeper and more interesting than "obligatory character who is generally helpful". Really helps to prevent writer's block as well!

In terms of name generators, there's two I like. Fantasy Name Generator is a big site with even DnD specific name generation for all the different races, including some monsters. Or, if you're looking for human names, Behind the Name is like a baby name site with a tool that will randomly generate a name from all the names on the site. You can even specify the region, gender, or syllables you want the generated name to have. GREAT for coming up with interesting and diverse names for side-characters and NPCs

I am a self-taught DM. Have played a game where I'm the player maybe twice as one-shots and haven't had anyone to walk me through how things work besides what I can find online. I am, however, a writer, and therefore very much wanted to homebrew a massive game for my friends. There's been a lot of stumbling, learning, and going back to fix things, but we're all having fun! These videos are VERY helpful! It did not even cross my mind that I could just re-skin some encounters that other people have made to fit it in for flavor. I will also say, I've gotten a massive amount of help using generative AI. Artwork for characters so the players have a face to a name and can connect with NPCs better, creating scenes for encounters for flavor, creating simple battle maps, etc. With all the time I take creating the story and dialogue, it's a huge help in the areas I don't have much talent in, such as map-making, artwork, and even generating ideas for one-off encounters while they're traveling from one destination to another. I hope that by the time they defeat the big bad in this campaign I can be a true master of Dungeon Mastering

Immediately this doesnt work at all. Because D&D is a Medieval High-Fantasy setting, and XCOM is a Modern-Futuristic High-Tech setting. XCOM is more fitting in a Modern D20 system. because it is more calibrated for Modern-Futuristic settings, and it is robust enough to allow for all types of aliens, robots, mecha, cyborgs and ethereals to exist in the gameplay. D&D is more melee focused. A bow and crossbow isn't going to cut it for technological advancements compared to what the aliens are bringing to the fight. No room for advancement, no means of doing xenobiological research, or even dissecting the aliens to learn more about their genetics, since at most, a healer would consider leeches or bleeding someone in order to "heal" them, or force a potion down their throat to get back a small portion of their hit points, without any scientific understanding of how or why it works. It just does. No, for XCOM it would need to be run in a system that is more accurate to the game itself.

What happened? 6 years since this was posted with no more DM 101 videos. This series has helped me more than any other series on KZfaq to help me find my DMing feet.

Is it possible to improvise a lot of the campaign? Not all but a lot

This is helpful, thank you!

I’ve been playing empire for 9 years but the impact you and this series has had on empire is massive

Ugh. My kids asked me to learn to DM, and this video is making me feel as if I'm being trained to groom liberals via rpg. I'll modify re: turd advisement.

Not going to read all, not sure if mentioned. Late on thread, but a trick we used in the 90s was to dump rice onto paper and trace the rice. Gave nice coastlines and continents

It's insane how in Empire you guys are reliving & reenacting 1000 years of religious human history pre 1798. In 1798, Napoleon single handedly destroyed the most powerful terrorist organization on earth, the Vatican, and put Pope Pious VI in the darkest dungeon Bonaparte could find. This most epic & heroic feat is the reason the freedom of consciousness exist in the UK & US today.

I'm a player in a very chaotic group. I have the utmost respect for my DM because we are constantly doing weird things. At one point a dragonborn paladin pretended to be pregnant with a dead halfling. He had to figure out what to do when it "gave birth" to the halfling while trying to resurrect her in a blessed well. We were literally surrounded by temples, but no...we had to dunk her in the well and get her possessed by like a thousand demons. Oh, and an NPC turned into a goat. That was a thing.

Today I got asked if i wanted to DM for two friends. They are freshly new to DnD similarly to myself(however ive watched a few streams of people playing and I vaguely know the basics). DM'ing for first time players that dont know anything will be a bit horrifying especially since i have no idea how good my improv is. I already have a session 0 planned where i will get them to make their characters and i will explain how the game works in more detail. Im really exited for this. Im happy I found your videos to assist me with prep. Giant thanks for all of this man.

After watching us a route down all my notes and somebody messed that all up because they threw a sponge at an NPC.😅 lol

Your diction is so good, except you keep saying exetra! 😭 Maybe I’m just pedantic, but I’ve actually only ever heard kids mispronounce it, so it’s weird.

Bro likes mlp

Obsidian is a fantastic software. If you want cloud storage you'll have to give some money, but overall really good

This really helps has a new Dm learning how to be the Dm for my campaign I never really thought of the fact that the players also played a major role in the base story

I'm a new DM as well as a new player and this was really helpful. Looking forward to catching up on your content!

nailed the intro man🔥

I like the whiteboard, makes me feel like I am in a very different kind of seminar at university :)

thank you for the guide i dont watch anything about d&d but this chanle

My boy kept raping goblin bodies after they killed them. He stopped doing it as much when I gave him a disease if he didn't roll above a 5

Im the 1 thousandth comment lucky me

I'm just so glad the whiteboard worked xD

I wanted to learn basic rules. Instead i got 20 mins of "How to Babysit Millenials and Gen Zs". Didnt learn basic rules. Stop making misleading videos.

I have years of experience as a writer, primarily in role-playing settings, and have crafted numerous worlds, religions, pantheons, and myths. Despite my experience in world creation, I am a novice Dungeon Master (DM) and am currently leading a group for the first time. Your videos have proven invaluable, providing a wealth of ideas to enhance my DM skills and preparation.

Is no one going to talk about how perfectly he did Victors voice from critical role?

watched this when it first came out. been to empire twice now and can say it is amazing

Whiteboard lighting issue... Outside in the sun.

I love the books by caroline peckman and susanne valenti.....it now makes me think they were playing DND and just wrote the story based off what their players did...

My 9 year old daughter what's to play and I'm not really sure where to start for her. Any tips. Input from chat is definitely welcomed lol.

I have Google and KZfaq searched How to play D&D, D&D apps, tips, etc and _never_ heard of "Roll 20" or "Fancy Grounds"... I'm trying to learn/play but it's not helpful when these resources aren't even being presented 😮‍💨 Edit; - and what the hell is dice camera action or "seeringscape(?)" ??? Bro, why am I not coming across any of these crucial resources 🤷

19:00 THIS

Step one, ask for conse.... wrong channel

I'm DMing at an SEN youth group I volunteer for and I'm very excited as are they so thank you for this series!

From America and this condom isn't erasing my pencil markings.

Applejack best pone /)

Timestamps so far: 0:00 Introduction 5:19 Part 1 - Notetaking tools 6:06 Google Docs 7:03 MS OneNote 7:40 Scrivener (offers free trial, then one-time purchase) 9:07 Wiki tools 9:49 Trello (subscription) 10:36 Part 2 - Formatting notes 11:07 Session notes

Very nice video. Many thanks for the gift!

I have learned a lot from this and I am a first time dm

Obsidian. Seriously one of the best note apps ever made

This was so intersting tor. Now I’m going to check out Kahn Academy’s vids on Geography. Also, love the shoutout to Civilization. I recently got super hooked on Civ6.

I'd like to send this to some parents of kids we will have next week for a Dungeons & Dragons camp :)

This has been one of the most helpful videos I've watched so far in preparation to my first campaign session this weekend!

👍👍👍👍👍

Random list of names 🤦 how did I not think of that

Me and my friends play a botched version of dungeons and dragons because none of us know the full rule set im always the dungeon master, because I know the most recently I’ve been working on a campaign that is more old-fashioned to actual dnd this is because of an argument, my friends had in our game they were able to fight the main boss first thing and they were basically on his level. This is kind of threw me off of it and made me want to look into the actual game we don’t like traditional story like that appreciate it, so they usually expect me to make one isn’t what I’m working on is Jjk theme 😅

lol, you started this series when I started playing D&D, and now I'm watching it to get an edge in my first campaign! Thank you so much for you help.

I'm playing DND for the first time today, DMing for my sister and mom in a sort of campaign. I still need to learn more about the game mechanics, but I figured the first encounter out (more or less). I'm so excited :3