Questions answered. How do you get players to roleplay? How should DMs handle the "evil" races? How do you know your big bad fight will be good? How do you avoid frustration when players miss something you worked hard on?

"The father of role-playing games," Gary Gygax's, story. A tumultuous tale of obsession, backstabbing, and betrayal, that, in the end, defined him as the creator of the beloved game Dungeons and Dragons."The father of role-playing games," Gary Gygax's, story. A tumultuous tale of obsession, backstabbing, and betrayal, that, in the end, defined him as the creator of the beloved game Dungeons and Dragons.

What do you do if violence is the only solution your players present to your problems? If you feel your players are constantly ruining your game with their murderous antics, how can you fix that? And did you actually throw the first stone?

For the past year, I have been DMing a three season live play show on the Frogpants Network—There Will Be Dungeons: Delvers. This episode is a peek behind the curtain to talk about the production goals of that show and how it was run. It's also a tale of corporative storytelling and the importance of music.

There are many magical damage types: poison, acid, fire, cold, radiant, necrotic, lightning, thunder, force, and psychic. They all follow the rules of damage, but different monsters host different interactions. Use these elements to design interesting combat encounters and even entire dungeons.

Three big questions with three big answers. How can you make puzzles make sense? While things may not be realistic all the time, here are several tricks to get a puzzle working in your world. Kyle also tackles how to end a campaign and how to home flavor an undead dragon for your big bad ending.

Puzzles are not content unless they are interactive. Riddles, codes, logic, and grid puzzles can all be crafted to create a cooperative challenge. This episode includes famous puzzles such as One Tells the Truth One Lies and the Ravensborg's Guild.

Rules for player weapons continued. Player weapons are divided into three types: bludgeoning, slashing, and piercing. These damage types can play into features on your monsters, particularly their defenses—resistances , vulnerabilities, and immunities. To use these effectively as part of the combat monster puzzles, we must first understand their mechanical meaning.

Rules for player weapons continued. Player weapons are divided into three types: bludgeoning, slashing, and piercing. These damage types can play into features on your monsters, particularly their defenses—resistances , vulnerabilities, and immunities. To use these effectively as part of the combat monster puzzles, we must first understand their mechanical meaning.

A DM must know what the players know. Weapon properties, two-weapon fighting, and finesse can all be quite confusing if not overwhelming. This episode goes over the simple and martial proficiencies, where proficiencies come from, and how your players got them. Understanding these will allow you to give proper loot, make better custom monsters, and help steer your players toward optimization so you can run more difficult encounters.

How to read a character sheet as told through a goblin adventure. The age of digital D&D player preparations have left DMs ill-prepared for teaching players. Here, Kyle discusses not only how to teach players to read their characters but also what the DM should know to look for when starting a session.

Season 8 wraps up with questions from the mailbag. How can you handle players roleplaying outside their stats? Why do groups always fall apart? Should a level 3 spell deal 48d6 damage? And is it the job of the DM to make sure the party is balanced?

Balls and gala events are great climactic set pieces, but pulling them off can be tricky. By taking a look through history, we can identify what makes them unique and how you can transform an overwhelming night of NPC interaction into a interactive skill challenge and social event for your players.

Players will surprise you with roleplay, be it a natural 20 Persuasion or unknown spell. Be prepared for the odd languages and have a plan for player spells, like comprehend languages, tongues, speak with dead, and speak with plants.

There is nothing wrong with filler combat when used appropriately. Give yourself a break from planning the main plot and add some filler while you figure out the next step.

Traps are cool, but they need proper setup and delivery. It's not just order of operations and mechanics, it's about tension and theming.

This mailbag tackles a multipart question from a new DM, how to make use of player theories, setting your own expectations for session zero, and how to deal with one of the most difficult problem players—the "but that's just what my character would do."

Every DM wants big set pieces packed with crowds for their players to be heroic in, but how do you manage such a scene? Here are tips and strategies to reduce your burden in executing the masses while still giving your players achievable goals and objectives.

Players love the idea of owning a castle, but all the hard work of running and managing its execution falls on the DM. Use these tricks to keep your fort from getting bogged down!

The life of adventure can be thrilling, but a functional world and economy means that some tasks might be more mundane. Create a montage for your players using assorted skill challenges to help showcase their impact on the world beyond just saving it from the big bad.

Livestreams and podcasts of D&D should be different from your home games. Factors like linear stories, paid actors, an audience, combat adaptations, world lore, and even being stuck in a chair change D&D from a game into a product. Enjoy your hobby and avoid stressing.

On this season's mailbag finale, Kyle answers a lot of questions, including those about "Help! I agreed to DM!", planning your adventurers' day, working with established worlds, time jumps, fast travel, and ending or continuing when losing players.

On this episode, Kyle delves into the origins of the paladin class, starting with the original use of the word in epic poetry. The class has evolved constantly throughout the editions, culminating in the 5e version we have today.

In a D&D campaign, you are going to run through a lot of villains. In this episode, Kyle teaches you a technique for quickly creating an array of villain types you can use to build a diverse rogues' gallery.