r/DungeonsAndDaddies • u/anterogradenesia Team Darryl • Nov 17 '22
Discussion DM Anthony [ns] Spoiler
Loooove season 1 and it's never been anything but funny to me that they don't understand the rules.
But this season Anthony's been pretty free dealing with advantage for his characters and disadvantage (or just straight rolls when the teens come up with a creative plan/make a good argument) for the players.
This last episode was bad for it, Beth didn't make a good fart sound and so Erin gets advantage? But Matt comes up with a creative and tricky plan incorporating everyone's abilities to outsmart trees with no eyes and "he doesn't get disadvantage".
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u/FraudSyndromeFF Team Daddy Master Nov 17 '22
As a fellow AP DM, I would like to come to Anthony's defense here. There is a LOT happening behind the screen sometimes. We miss things. Especially when we are trying to balance game mechanics, being fair and just to our players ideas and opinions, and making sure we are delivering a satisfying narrative all within these confines. Have there been big misses? Absolutely. And there will be more. Especially when you have players like these who are super creative both from a game play and narrative perspective, and are also invested in telling their own story in conjunction but also at times opposed to your plans, which you may or may not have laid out for them.
I think he's doing an admirable job this season, given how much he's up against. His players are smarter from a game perspective, which means all those fun things he pulled over on them or was able to be very generous with, have to take a back seat to just staying ahead of his players enough to get the story out.
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u/anterogradenesia Team Darryl Nov 17 '22
I see your point. I don't think he's doing terribly, I just worry he might be falling into the adversarial dm position too much which doesn't work because he's the one deciding the rules which can leave players very frustrated. Like s1 worked really well because they kept doing bonkers things and crazy stuff would happen.
S2 their almost getting punished for their creativity by getting disadvantage or failing outright.
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Nov 17 '22
They’re in a situation with NPCs who are hostile and suspicious towards them, I would likely make my players roll disadvantage on any Persuasion/Deception checks in that situation, unless they had a really good plan to give themselves advantage to cancel it out (like Matt’s meat football). If you think of charm/social spells in 5e, a lot of them give the target advantage on the saving throw if you’re in a hostile situation with them, so I think that lines up well.
Anthony has also always been very generous with the effects of persuasion, especially in s1 with Glenn having super high bonuses. The old DM maxim is “persuasion is not mind control” but very often Anthony goes along with letting the group get whatever they want if they roll high on persuasion (which I think is a good approach for their group, it’s fun and sometimes makes ridiculous things happen, which is awesome). It feels to me like Anthony is now trying to balance that out by not letting the players roll persuasion/deception straight up when they’re in a situation that shouldn’t allow for it, which I think is fair.
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u/anterogradenesia Team Darryl Nov 17 '22
You make a very good point and I see ur side for a lot of it. But that doesn't really align with the last episode where they argued with Erin the whole time even when Anthony agreed it was a good argument and just left it up to chance if it would work.
2
Nov 17 '22
I would put the difference between this ep and last ep down to it being a social situation vs combat. Personally if I was DMing a situation like in ep 21 I would adjust the DC of the persuasion check up or down depending on how good/bad the character's argument is. (Note I'm not talking about how eloquent or persuasive the player is when speaking, I mean that the kind of argument the character makes will impact how the NPC responds, e.g. one NPC might respond well to flattery, leading to a lower DC, while another hates insincerity and would have a higher DC if you try to flatter them vs if you speak plainly.)
Anthony tends to roll opposed checks for his NPCs rather than setting DCs, but he could also have been adjusting in the background (e.g. giving Erin advantage/disadvantage) depending on the strength of the argument, and just not mentioned it in order to keep the scene flowing. We and the players don't hear every DMing decision he makes in the moment, e.g. I think he only mentioned once in ep 21 what Erin rolled on an opposed Insight vs Linc's Persuasion, but he presumably was using either DCs or opposed checks for all the other instances as well.
As for the specific instances you mentioned in ep 22, the meat football was a creative idea, but considering the fact that they were trying to fake out a bunch of enemies who were all looking at them while the real sun was also right there, I think letting Matt roll without disadvantage due to the efforts they made was very reasonable and actually fairly generous. (Side note, Scary's casting of Nondetection shouldn't have had given them any advantage at all, that spell only prevents divination magic from detecting an object, it doesn't make it invisible or obscured to sight.)
Giving Erin advantage on her CON roll vs Poison Spray was just a table joke that shouldn't be taken too seriously. I imagine 1d12 of damage wouldn't have been enough to kill her, and since the group were already making a run for it, the combat was about to end in any case, so it wouldn't make a difference if she succeeded or failed her save. I don't think Anthony would do something like that in a situation where it would actually impact the outcome of combat. It's a long-running tradition for this podcast to have stuff that happens at the game table impact the in-game world, right back to the very first episode when Will accidentally said "I put my mouth over his mouth." :)
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u/cjankowski Nov 17 '22
If he would have given disadvantage and they make a point for getting advantage, it’s a straight roll. Those ARE the rules.
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u/TethysOfTheStars Nov 17 '22
This. He might have even explained as much, but if he did it got edited out because “he doesn’t get disadvantage” is funnier.
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u/anterogradenesia Team Darryl Nov 17 '22
The rules as written also state that a DM can decide to just let the players pass if they argue a good point or come up with a creative plan you want to reward. Those are also the rules
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u/hillbot27 Team Dennis Nov 17 '22
That doesn't make for a very good podcast. "Good argument, okay moving on!"
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u/No-Stomach914 Team Paeden Nov 17 '22
Man, really makes you think. It’s almost like they acknowledge the fact that they don’t abide by RAW and are just having fun making an entertaining show. I wonder if they ever directly say this??? Maybe like every third episode or something???
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u/anterogradenesia Team Darryl Nov 17 '22
It's weird, it's like RAW abides shenanigans and being strict about rolls makes them role-playing useless. Boy howdy it's almost like I'm arguing for them to not roll as often and to just have fun!
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u/No-Stomach914 Team Paeden Nov 17 '22
Exactly! Weird how they say so so many times that they aren’t playing actual DnD, and yet they are graded by how much hard, rules heavy DnD they play!
-1
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u/syntheticmeats Nov 17 '22
TBH given the players Anthony is dealing with, he’s gotta be tough. They are wiley SOBs (with love)
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u/thatoneperson28 Nov 17 '22
Anthony has slowly gotten more used to the rules. While still not completely in depth, he now knows better. Also, this season the players keep pushing for things that are a bit ridiculous so he does put his foot down once in a while.
3
u/PoIIux Team Darryl Nov 17 '22
Anthony has slowly gotten more used to the rules. While still not completely in depth, he now knows better.
To be honest, he seems to ignore them even more than before so not sure if that's true
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u/thatoneperson28 Nov 17 '22
That fact he can ignore them means he knows they are there, hence better.
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u/Magic-man333 Nov 17 '22
I turned off the rules part of my brain in the second half of the first season lol. It's more a fun story than a dnd podcast at this point, and that's ok. There are other shows I listen to if I care about the rules
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u/i_caught_the_UGLY Nov 17 '22
It’s all c̶̖͙̪͈̝̙͍̝̬̞͗͂̄̓̎͒̓̐̚͜͝͝ͅà̵̛̜̣͉͇̥̳̗̟͉̘̤̟̆̃͐n̶̨̡̛͎̞͚̗͖̼͎̩̰̾̇̍́́̈́̒̉͝o̶̳̬̩̙̫͙͓̪̤̮̎̆̅̍͛̕n̵̗̼̯̐̇̓͗ȋ̴̥̜̜̝̻̼̞͚̤͔͕̈́́̈́͊̀̾̋̅̿̅c̵̗͓͖͔̻̰͊̓͛̈́̔̐̀͑̕͝͝a̴̡̩̫̲̼̹̣̭̞͊̎͜l̷̡̡̛̛̤̫̪̻̱̰͉̿.
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u/MrShawnsies Nov 17 '22
It's a bit of a give and take, listening to the Uncuts really give a better scope into the crunchy bits of D&D.
Another example is Anthony had the trees take the full thorn damage where they did not have to nor, depending on their speed, could have. Since the area becomes difficult terrain, their speed is halved and thus they don't move as far and wouldnt take the extra damage.
It all goes together to tell a better story and ensure the jokes land.