D&D Story: Worst Games I've Run || A Whole Lot of Talking

"I wanna roll Intelligence to figure out wtf is happening with this campaign"
"Throw a save instead"

@@lukeheuwin9947 "Make it a con save. The module has caused an auto-immune response in your body."

@@lukeheuwin9947 !¹

@@Ithtorukk 1a1

"Im going to sue myself for defamation"

Usually our games last like, 6 to 8 hours tops on weekends
45 minutes just pure chatting to unrelevant npc's would still be a massive waste of time holy shit

I would really like to know what module this is.

So does anyone know what module he's talking about? I know he fudged details, but there has to be one person watching who can reverse engineer what module he's talking about from his modified version.

@@MarsM13 I would like to know this too

So, a D&D player made it? How do we narrow it down!

It's so very much super low effort. I've never made, or run, a module in my life and I could probably manage something better. And nobody either did any quality control on the modules or whoever made it is friends with the people who decide what modules to run, or is one of them who made the decision.

In a long campaign it is one thing, you could do things like that for RP reasons, like having the players being invited to a fancy ball or party that isn't relevant to the plot, not just for burning some time but to let them enjoy some off time and have a little none plot related fun. In a 2 hour long convention module it is not bad, but a massive waste of the players time.
In fact, having a little none plot related off time now and then in a campaign is not a bad idea, maybe they are used to go to the Barons fancy parties and then suddenly the villain hit when the players don't expect it and are busy being drunk, flirting with nobles and otherwise enjoying themselves. The first time they are invited to something like that they expect trouble but the fourth time, they think it is just a way to blow off steam by then.
Even pointless things can come up later as well, maybe the players get to know a merchant who can get them rare items they need later, maybe someone they learn to know becomes a friend, gets kidnapped or in fact is a bad guy in disguise.
But what works in a long campaign does not work in a short 2 hour session, it is kinda like comparing a show like Naruto or Fairy tail with a short movie, you can't have same pacing in both. Pacing is very important when you DM, and it is something you hopefully can customize to your player group. Some players want constant fights, others take their time and can spend half an hour with a few pints at the local tavern. As a DM it is your job to see that all the players have fun, sure, you might TPK them now and then but you are not allowed to bore them.
And of course, when players actually pay to play a 2 hour module you really should make it's worth their money. I did wrote a lot of con modules in the past (which also let's you get in free and it is great when you have made something the players like but it is a lot of work so now I just pay to get in, and maybe I run a module if something seems fun, otherwise I just stay as a player (which of course still can be disappointing but some modules are really good).

Yeah, that should be optional if anything.
I did start a few D&D campaigns with something similar. I refer to it as the "Cart start" or the "Skyrim start" or the "Todd Howard opener". Sadly the campiagns didn't last more than a couple of sessions.
Since most of the characters did not know each other, they would start in a situation where they all were all on a cart going to their destination. I put a timer up, described the weather, and what they saw, and once the description was done, said they were a short distance from the destination but the cart was still moving. Put a timer up for 15 minutes and let the players talk.
The players sat there and introduced one another, made some jokes, comments, etc, just overall established themselves a bit.
First time they arrived at a location no trouble. They rode with an NPC I made up that was meant to be a recurring helpful but mysterious bard.
Second time the care had a driver who was a comical character based on a coworker. After 15 minutes the cart fell into an artificial sinkhole made by thieving kobolds. The NPC died in the fall, the players were uninjured but half their stuff was missing. They had to get themselves out of the caves they were dropped into, and find their stuff on the way out (That was the first adventurer).
Third time they were being driven across a river on a barge along with a vegetable merchant with a cart. 15 minutes in, the river suddenly was flooded violently and the players, barge, and vegetable cart are thrown over a waterfall. On the way down the vegetable merchant screamed out "MY CABBAGES!"
The players woke up a couple of hours not sure how far down the river they floated, but otherwise fine.

"This entire module is just a filler episode"

my player's have no problems killing 45 minutes of time with small talk, I normally have to step in and say "Okay guys, this scenario is happening." just to get the show on the road but they seem to be having fun just talking that I don't want to ruin it, and when we're actually playing no one seems to be that talkative anymore so I wonder if they are having fun.
There was one time they talked to each other for 2 hours leaving me with only 1 hour to run the game. Like "shoot, I don't think I'm good at this." and they tell me "no, no, you're fine." and I'm wondering "okay do you mean that? Or are just saying it not to hurt my feelings?"

That's the moment where I decide that there's an animated clock enemy called '45 minutes' in the village.

I would cast the spell discard module and use a past Role-play I have from memory.

Exactly

I mean, they at least seemed fun to play. Those seem like they either melt your brain or put you to sleep

I know right

We're considered old now?

Apparently so. Which makes me excited to hear about the bad ones.

This is why i prefer running improve or my own stories

@@emperorkraglint9792 i tend to just copy stories from random shows and adapt it to my campaign..the most succesfull game i ever made was literally the story arc of the 4th season of winx club.. the players loved it and to this date they dont know that they were jsut playing the story of winx club..
But i mean, cult of evil sorcerers who enslaved the whole fairy race in a magical mcguffin to use it ina ritual to attain the ultimate power couldnt complete the ritual because there's one fairy missing, and now are looking for tha alst fairy on earth who also has soemthign the party wants (which is to restore magic to a palce that lost its magic)... was a pretty interesting premise, specially because at certain point the enslaved fairies get accidentally freed and have nothing other than revenge against humanity in their head, creating a power struggle where the sorcerers want the fairy as a sacrifice to complete the ritual, the party wants the fairy to restore magic in certain wastelands and the warmonger fairies want the fairy as a both asoldier and someone that guides them in their crusade against humanity since they need a leader who's familiar with earth since that would give them a massive tactical advantage and it turns out that that fairy is the daughter of the fairy queen and an actual heir to the throne of fairies.
needless to say there were amazing plot twists and revelations at each point of the campaign even though i was just literally copying the story of a show that they had never ever watched.

@@anon2447
Hey, Winx Club fan here! Never thought I'd hear of that show in DnD!

@@DrawciaGleam02 well the premise of the show is amazing!! so with a little adaptation it makes for great campaigns!,

@@DrawciaGleam02 Winx Club was my Childhood!!!! I wish i could make a winx dnd system and get people to actually play

This is the same energy as
"It hot and ready pizza"
"Is it good?"
"I said it HOT, and it READY"

@@dimsum3329 It's Almost Pizza™!

Unless your most of the 5e modules your probably bad

I love that video!

Well, it is actually, especially if someone keeps asking questions. It just isn't fun to be the person asking the questions when you literally do not care.

Idk why but people will do that to me. So there are people to do it. Idk why though -_-

Person who write that module clearly didn't play any successful game himself. Like WTF? From when wasting time of payers is the point of the game? What someone snif when he come with that 0_0

yes it is very normal fellow human

The best ad-lib I could come up with off the top of my head to waste 45min would probably be some kind of festival, that way the players have something to do I guess.

What kind of high school did you go to where it's just sitting there for 4 hours while someone you have to pay attention to blabbers on.... endlessly.... with no useful information to give..... Holy crap, it IS high school!!! 😂

He said it was a mistery campaign not a horror

The 'bad' modules is just a metaphor for the days of the schedule when the school lunch has the food nobody likes.

@@lhamolhama4594 It's a "Mystery" campaign, not a "misery" campaign lol

Sounds to me more like going off for a business training course.
"We're sending you to New York for three days to take this course from one of our third-party software vendors."
"Interesting. That sounds neat."
"BTW, the class starts fifteen minutes after you land and you'll need to head to the airport right from the last class at 9pm at night. Also the classes take up 14 hours each day giving you no time to do anything but travel from the class to the hotel and back. Just be sure to have all of your luggage with you for the last class."
"... Lovely."
"Also, even though you live next to a large airport and do a long ass commute to work, we're going to schedule your flights to and from the airport closer to the offices here, which means you'll have to drive 3 hours to and from the airport rather than 15 minutes."
(updates resume) "Gotcha."

This is the type of modules that makes players open portals to random places or summon random stuff.

It is a mistake, just not his. The module is a mistake. It should not exist

Its his mistake. Why are you running modules you don´t know?
Why pick that? Go to something safer that you know. If you wanna try something new, then get enough time to prepare and READ the whole thing. Then you would realize how terrible a module is and decide to change it for another.

@@chilai
Did you even listened? He was given the choice of a bunch of modules. He picked three. Read them, and ran them. He did not pick what modules he ran, that was decided by the convention organizers. He did not know what any of the modules where.
His mistake was not picking a module he did not know, it was picking three different modules instead of one.

@@ODDnanref actaully it was because he did six instead of 2 or 3

Wouldn’t be surprised if that guy being the first NPC just WAS the evidence you were supposed to have. Knowing the trope was out there and using it as an excuse to not have clues. I have no way of knowing that, especially since I haven’t seen the module, but it sounds like something a hack writer would do.

That sounds so bad it's hilarious, I wish I could see DM's face as you basically yolo it, and then has to try and explain why it was the guy.

Problem is, you can't do that in Adventure League, because it's supposed to be standardized.

@@XthorgoldX According to the DMG for AL, you can change some stuff up to make the game flow a lot better. As long as you maintain the spirit of the adventure and don't implement houserules, you can adjust as need be.

Some of the conventions I've been to will revoke your badge pass for deviating from their assigned modules/campaign rules (for any game, not just dnd). Times come up where it's like "players really not having fun, can I change it so they do have fun?" and con staff say absolutely not. Really sad situation. :C It's why I stopped volunteering my time to host or dm stuff.

@@XthorgoldX Then they need to be changed. How is the DM supposed to give players a good adventure if they're given NOTHING to work with?

@@sovest555 this is different from changing the whole game like OP said lol

And to think that someone was paid actual money to write this....

@@DarkKingHades And to think someone wrote this, another person looked at this and said, YUP! This is a good game!! Sigh.

Fuck you sick ass

@@georgiannetaylor6519 calm down

@@DarkKingHades I imagine that, either:
The company was told to make a module with X parts to it, but only had plans for X - 1 modules. So filled one in.
Or the writer massively protracted and wrote the module he was supposed to in like half an hour, and it was too late for the company to have it done again

The bush is the final villain all along. All according to Keikaku.

@@WeirdWonderful I don't really know what this is a reference to, but...
Keikaku means "Plan", right?

@@paxgallery6646 Pretty much, its a reference to Warhammer, I think fantasy.

@@paxgallery6646 It’s a reference to some infamous subtitles for… I think it was Death Note? The subtitles said pretty much exactly what the second half of The Weird and the Wonderful’s comment says, but had a translator’s note stating that keikaku means plan, instead of actually translating one single additional word in the subtitles.

"Maybe johnny is vampire?" is my favotire dumb explanation for something equally dumb. The guy who made "The room" Tommy wiseau wanted the main character johnny to have a flying car and when asked why johnny would have a fkying car said "maybe johnny is vampire?"

Must be a relative of Rando Moccasion.

Justin Case was an original Ace Attorney character I wrote. He was always over prepared for any situation. Having random things on his person that he would justify having "Justin Case".

@@jolynekujobackfromprison744
This makes me think of Denny Crane from Boston Legal

@@ryanalving3785 Might have to watch that show. Lawyer shows and movies are a guilty pleasure of mine.

Does he have a cousin named Justin Time? 😉

This is a criminally underated comment

@Bjorn Arnesen Chadwick Strongpants scared off the right gang leader while still in the wrong town. Boom, saved everyone two hours of wasted time.

Let’s not forget how you then get information from some random gang leader for 25 minutes, then a random person shows up and then the module just ends.
We don’t need those silly modules like Curse of St-...Straws? we don’t need those with this masterpiece.

Yeah that sounds like a nightmare module for the DM and the players. That's why if you want a good D&D session, you let the DM run and create the story.

Well.... As Ben pointed out, it's part of a series of modules. So I'm gonna guess that the modules before and after it are way more intense and action packed and that one is supposed to be a breather where the players running through the series can do some role playing to recover.
Which probably works fine when the modules -are- actually run in succession. But not when the module gets run as a standalone.

It's scary how many AL Mods have an instruction like that.

Sounds to me like a module requiring a very dialed-in DM to run it. It's like going to the camp in Dragon Age. Not exactly action-packed, but rife with opportunities to flesh out the PCs if the DM is on point. It's something I'd save for a long-term group after we've had a few brews rather than running at a con, though.

Time to cast the spell that everybody claimed the Bard shouldn't have picked as a known spell: Speak with Plants !

@@Nr4747 Speak with Plants is an underrated spell
It sounds dumb as fuck, until you realize that you can interrogate blades of grass for information about anything that's happened in the last day. If you come across a murder scene, you can get down and make the dandelion in the sidewalk tell you who done it.
Plants have no possible motivation to lie to you and no criminal in their right mind is going to go out of their way to make sure the fucking grass can't see their face.

@@emilygordbort7300 Yeah, but that requires a lot of DM buy-in because the DM might simply say that the plants aren't sentient enough to really remember much that happened more than a few hours ago.

@@Nr4747 The spell description specifically says that they can remember things that have happened that happened in the spell area during the last day. Area of effect is everything within 30 feet from the caster at the time of casting, so if a Tree was within 30 feet of something you want to hear about within the last 24 hours, the tree knows.
If the DM ignores the text of a spell just to make the spell not useful for the purpose that's stated in literally the first paragraph of the statblock, they're doing their job wrong. Assuming no malice on the DM's part, either they didn't prepare for one of the players to find a shortcut and are trying to cover their ass, or they didn't read the spell.

@@emilygordbort7300 Ok, I must admit that I had forgotten that one day is specified. That makes the spell occasionally quite useful, I'll give you that.

technically, they did win

They went out of their way to blunder into a kill encounter, and survived, which just hightened the atmosphere of "everything in this place can and will try to kill you".
Sounds like it went well to me

I don't like murderhoboing because it makes me feel bad BUT I know that it just makes a lot of things happen. If it was done in an honest way with players making evil characters and compromising to actually follow some plot it could be a really entertaining game

@@jpereda97 Murder hobo happen when people are tired...one time i had on campaing that we got stuck in a city for days.... Soo we decided to ignore all the laws and just kill everything that we think that was a criminal. The situation got soo annoying,that we just peace out the city,while our ent destroyed a tower and took their balista.

So I played a character that my DM approved... a rogue dwarf. He saw some shiny, good quality armor he wanted. Ended up killing the blacksmith and his wife with aide from a barbarian and a tiefling due to low rolls on barbarians part. If the barbarian hadn’t have gotten involved, I would have gotten away with some decent gear with no fuss. My rolls were decent 13-18, for stealth, but kept getting thwarted by barbarian’s copied attempts, 3-7, till he rolled a nat 1 to knock the blacksmith unconscious. Somehow ended up killing him instead, high str mod I think. The wife had just finished something inside and came out as we were stuffing a bag full of gear. It was complicated and the teifling shot her with an arrow. What was worse was the teifling was cursed to only repeat the last sound he heard when trying to speak. Thus not only did her death screech alert the guards to trouble, but the teifling gave us away as well. Yes, my character started the momentum by stealing, but aside from the arrow killing the wife, I was having some of the best rolls.

45 minutes of red herrings can be fine in your regular game. Gets the PCs role playing and not all leads will be good leads. But 45 minutes in a 2 hour slot? Thats 1/3 of your time in a one shot and one shots are designed to be faster paced and better flow to keep everything moving and people having fun.

I mean talking can be fun, I had a pretty interesting conversation in a DND campaign recently.

I'm guessing because the person who made it either had to make it or thought it would be fun.

How did it get through playtesting?

@@MrTohawk either it didn't, or all the playtest games were run by the writer who did know what was going on. i wouldn't be at all surprised if the coordinators downloaded someones free, self-published module to keep costs down.

@@MrTohawk Maybe Puffin was the playtester :0

I'm guessing it was just part of a set, by the plot kinda.. not happening- probably meant for worldbuilding

"Just a milk run" they said...

I'd help the shit out of my players so they kill the baddie just for the sake to take a crap on whoever wrote such a module.

"Oh, and spoiler: the murderer is required to get away at the end of the module, so they can appear in the next module."
...ugh

Don't worry, most comments are kind of off topic. Like that one guy saying "First" or "69th like" or anything personal.

"This is a message from Lord Nergal: I MADE AN AL MODULE!"

@@XellosNi Thanks, I needed this laugh today.

I kind of love how "Read more/Show Less" pops up at the end of and your like - wait, what?!?

I went to a D&D night for the first time in 10 years. The module was garbage. It was horrible. Going to this school to find out why kids are disappearing, it was like it was written for kids. Only 1 combat for only 1 character. The rest was just move this item, or be quiet. So stupid.

@@SasuHol Al modules aren't terribly great. There are some that are really fun! Yet there are some that leave you questioning why you played. I don't play or run AL anymore as it's just more fun to not have all the restrictions. The CoS adventures were pretty good, but I'm a sucker for Ravenloft. I Think "The Broken One" was my favorite. "Whispers in the Dark" for the ToA season was good too. I can name a few more, but generally they aren't as fun.

if it's trash talking a campaign to just explain the campaign then it might deserve to be trash talked

Well, I have met AL DM’s, and usually, there is a period where players play test the module to see if there are problems. Some are fine, but new some tweaks. These tests are often at conventions. The featured story might have been one that needs a lot of work.

@@finris1 thats brutal but it explains the revenue model and why the dms can get in for free. What a trap.

@@Avenus112 Even without the play testing, it was a free way to supply your events with DMs. Why pay people when you can convince them to do it for free, and that it's a perk while your at it.

​@@finris1 But if this were a playtest session, aren't you supposed to let the DM know in the first place? because the whole point of playtesting is not just running the game, but taking up notes about player reactions, balancing, and the overall experience usually from some guidelines from the game designers (like highlighting certain points of the game like specific encounters where the game/module is supposed to excel at) and from what Ben told he pretty much ran a regular game without bothering to _"QA"_ it.
Honestly it just sounds as he told it: The coordinators gave him a terrible module without bothering to review it first and he and his players ended up wasting time.

That's because the writer didn't have anything of value to bring to the module in the first place. It's an empty time-waster that goes nowhere. They basically wrote a filler episode for a show, which doesn't work for people to actually play through and that might be the only thing those players experience while they're there.

70 minutes becuase of teh extra 25 minutes to be killed

@@InfernosReaper Sounds like you recognized the module. Care2share?

Maybe it's because I haven't done it, but a two hour time slot in general seems like nothing could get done.

@@InfernosReaper I'd love to know as well

That's only one aspect. They also need to be aware they're writing for gamers.
... you know, the ones who consistently see the main plot of a game and go "... nah, we're gonna spend hours playing with the physics engine, or ragdolling mooks off a cliff. Wonder who can get them the furthest?"
Plot and character progression has to take ... not a BACK seat, but a passenger seat ... because there's always that chance the players either pick up on the plot too early and try to skip it, or miss everything, or just fail those rolls you need them to succeed in to get the right information/tokens to continue.
When writing adventures, it's really good to not stop at just writing it... playtest it. Several times. With different groups. Or share it to people who you know are going to spot weak points.

@@kereminde you didn't contradict johns point. dm's still need to understand smooth progression

@@Pineapple-hx9ty I'm sorry, was I supposed to contradict it? I'll contradict yours - for AL it's not the DM's problem to understand or provide it. It's required to be there in the source material (the module).
But it's not entirely "you need to be a writer, first and foremost". First and foremost, the people who write modules need to understand they're not setting up a video game where there's only *one* method which can be programmed into things. IT's tabletop, where the players don't just think outside the box... they use dynamite to make a box stop existing.

PF Society play at the very least builds the modules under the assumption that the players might like to go on an adventure. You get your job, you go to the place, a complication will happily and more importantly always ensue, and you get to resolve it. They're typically built around the precept of the five room dungeon and they do it fairly well in my experience
good example in S4-01 Rise of the Goblin Guild: a goblin has stolen a treasure. Do you ask around for 45 minutes until someone randomly leads you to the thief? Heck no, you're chasing that sucker out a building, down an alley, through the streets and hopefully catch him

I know he wanted to be cordial and didn't want to name any of the bad writers, but for the sake of the hobby, yeah... THEY NEED TO BE OUTED.

😂😂

The problem is that when there's *nothing* that the NPCs have to offer that matters it's genuinely a waste of time and effort for everyone involved

@@InfernosReaper And then someone who didn't exist until precisely 45 mins passed turns up to deus ex them to the next location with the right info.
It could be someone they find after maybe three or four investigation/persuasion checks, and even then they get little tidbits of information that they can then use to get actual info from the last person.

Reminds me of this module I ran a few months ago, which featured these two NPCs who are siblings, but they don’t know they’re siblings. All well and good, except that they forgot to add any way for the PLAYERS to find out that these two NPCs are siblings.

Because it wasn’t AL, I ended up altering the module so the two NPCs actually did know they were siblings, they just hadn’t seen each other in years.

*"And may or may not disapear later?"

Don't do anything you find boring or that doesn't fit in an overall purpose into the story/world

@@melaniejason3912 Exactly! Someone who write that module deserve kick in nuts 0_0

These are a few tips I got from what annoyed Ben during this video:
1) Information should be presented to the DM in a straightforward, easy-to-read manner
2) Don't purposefully waste players' time
3) Modules should be self-contained adventures

@@aformofmatter8913 nice way to simplify and sum up his message , thanks

@@melaniejason3912 How vague.

Modules can be Bad.

This is why people homebrew

*this villian is in another **-cast-** I mean module*

The problem is that it is written as scenes in a story rather than opportunities for things the characters can do and events that occur in interesting places that occur in a progressing timeline. There is too much focus on the dressing and scenery and too little on meaningful choices.

@@SurmaSampo Implying there was any attention relegated to areas other than dressing and scenery.

Zero Punctuation?

@@StealthMarmot_ Indeed.

"Have you heard about the new tax law that's gone into effect?
No?
Well, now you have... _PAY UP!"_

*_Tell me more about audible sound._*

"I'm Commander Shepard, and this is my favorite comment in the comment section"

What do you mean?

Yeah. The Strahd thing was nice in its own right, and it's a great idea for a second channel, but it's not the main attraction.

Yeah, the curse of Strahd replay was great, but I do kinda wish other content had been mixed in

Same here

Yey

Trash

8j arreglos flrraleso

I've not been actively playing for a few years. What's AL?

@@FerretPirate, Adventurer's League.

FerretPirate Kind of a regulated rules version of dnd. "Designed" so that you can show up with a character and play and reduce the amount of "no I totally rolled 3 18's for my stats and my last dm gave me a +6 vorpal greatsword" type of interactions

I had a great time with AL, mostly because it wasn't official AL, players aren't very railroaded. The people I play with are awesome too. Its all jokes

@@sapotheo4515
So it wasn't Adventures League?

I bet it was around 20 to 40 bucks

I feel like it should be more than VidCon's Creator Track to be worth it. (Which l've always found to not be worth it, unless you already do KRplus for a living, and have money saved to balance out the price.)

I know with Fan Expo in Toronto, (I volunteered as a DM last year) The DM Badge also gave you access to priority entrances. An equivalent badge for a guest would be about $180 CAD.
But I didn't have to do as many mods, because I volunteered for late night epics.

@@joltman81 about $180 CAD
What's that in real money?😁

@@tomkerruish2982 ~120 Euro. Really doesn't seem worth it, imo.

The books are called The Bailey School Kids

Last I checked, no AL module has to be run as written. The only requirement is to the keep the number of combat encounters and the listed magic items intact.

Jeff Holloway So, what about Parnast?

@@GreenThingonTV which is kind of the problem, sometimes all a module really needs is an extra random encounter to fill up otherwise wasted space but no... You can't do that.

@@eveescastle5866 It is possible that even the combat encounters don't have to remain intact due to the changes from XP to Milestones. Regardless, it doesn't hurt for a DM to have a tool kit of Encounters, NPCS, and Puzzles to busy a group.

Eh, there's still a lot you can do through "DM Empowerment" to fix things.
For example, if adding a combat encounter would make the game more fun, go for it.

HELLOOOO! I am giving you tatoos, because I am so many classes that I can be a bush that gives strange magical tatoos. ISN'T THAT GREAAAAT?

Marc Van Leur I read it in the voice

@@Gnomeitall Read that in a Polish accent with a nerve damaged mouth.

Did the bush have a level in every class?

He said that and I thought he was just giving a very strange, ridiculous example and was disappointed because Ben normally does better than that. Then I realized he was being serious and was disappointed for a whole new reason.

Or just plain quality

Reminds me of Living Greyhawk modules from 3.5, where the quality was all over the place.

I wanna know!

@@ShinMajin same here.
Anyone else knows what module he's talking about?

@@dsandoval9396 Looks like the one with the bush might be called "Champion of the People."

It actually was his fault. He technically should read it first and then throw into ginger.

@@TheRezro Yeah but that is a technicality. Being handed modules that are absolute garbage in a convention such as this should not happen in the first place.

@@HORRIOR1 Agree.

Well the other really bad campaign he ran and did a video on was the Hero of Parnast and Traveller. Traveller wasn't the module though it was the game itself that ruin the session. Basically instead of rolling for stats, character creation has you roll for life events but this means you have an idea for a character, but it will not turn out that way because you had bad rolls which happened to two of the three players.

Didn't he already share some of those?

One of them might be Champion of the People, if you ever go for modules, I'd recommend A Scream in the Night/A Cog in the Wheel/A Hole in the World, it's a pretty decent plane hopping trilogy that doesn't actually require much work to remove all the AL rules and quirks to make it playable.

@@whiskeyhound that makes sense. But I've run Champion of the People like 5 times and the "bush" is actually a key component of the plot that should eventually lead you to the answer of the mystery. It's poorly written and takes some DM moving around and cohesion, but it's a fairly workable, if not enjoyable module. Plus, the reward is one of the more OP items available in AL.

@@888doom I think we might be talking about different modules, the one I referenced was a CCC and involved ghosts and zombies.

@@whiskeyhound uh, yeah. I mean, to be perfectly clear, the bush that is being refenced is the weed that NPCs are partaking of to communicate with the dead. Right? There's no other "bush" in that module.

@@888doom Gotta be a different one, there's no bush in the one I'm thinking of, just a bunch of npcs who got possessed by some ghosts.

I get the feeling that about 5 to 10 minutes in, the players realized that the entire module was designed exclusively to waste everyone’s time, including the DM’s. They really couldn’t blame Ben for this one, because he didn’t make it, nor did he really have a say in the matter.

I think these modules were written without thinking of the players either.

This crap was clearly written by someone who wanted to write something, but clearly not a game module, because nothing they do makes any sense for a game people play.

IIIII WAAAAAARNNNEED YOUUU

THIS MADE WATER SHOOT OUT MY NOSE

subscribing to see youtube sleuths at work.

I too would like to know the name of this module. I will start reading the Executioner to verify.

That definitely sounds like the first one, but any ideas on the second? I'd genuinely like to read through it

I think the second one might be DDAL04-10 The Artifact
But I haven't confirmed it as I haven't bought it yet.
Edit, looking more at the other comments it also looks like the second story could be champion of the people.

Don’t mind me just keeping notified on this thread

The players were fine, it was the module that was a mess.

Yo

Yeah, I stopped attending AL for that very reason. Everything is standardized out of necessity, which makes D&D a lot less fun imo.

AL is the HappyMeal of DnD, while DnD is the HappyMeal of TTRPG

@@bernatkun8069 where are the Big Macs then?

@@12isaac00 Dark Heresy.

@@GrugGangGrugGang *vomit*

@@georgiannetaylor6519 why

I have a theory for the later module that it was written with the idea that the DM would select one of the various NPCs to be the bad guy, and the events were all left vague so the DM could tie them to the NPC he selected.

Yeah that first one was really bad if that was the whole story, like it wouldn't be so bad if it was just an intermission between larger battles, cause I've had my group which is home brew spend literally two hours just walking around town improving our armor or just working on skills

Yeah I prefer action campaigns in which the story is in the combat rather than just straight up conversation like an action movie, a good one.

I love role-play heavy games, but that to me just sounds like bullshit. Literally nothing happens and it sounds like you don't get anything out of it. It just sounds like a major time filler, great if you need some downtime between major plot points/combat encounters, but for an individual session that's just bullshit.

Well a person made the module, if he gives too many details they might feel bad :(

@@defensivekobra3873 how are they going to learn if they are never told their module sucks arse.

@@popedassalxvi5375 True know that your work sucks is part of evolving...if you are unable to tell it. Then is better having other person to say it...then just not being choose all the time.

@@popedassalxvi5375 delivering constructive critisism is a Good thing, screaming said critisism into the Internet might be unwise

Well, a person wrote the module.
You might say that critiquing is part of it, but let's take a step back and think about how people tend to dogpile on things like this.

My daughter just ran this last night.
If you are wondering if it got less deadly over the last few years thanks to power creep, you're wrong.
((It was great. My players knew that a TPK was on the table and we had a blast))

There's a bunch of different explanations a DM can think of off the top of their head as to why this might be. Modules like these encourage creativity. They might not be intended to be played in adventure league where you're not allowed to change the plot, but encouraging creativity usually isn't a bad idea. If the DM doesn't have enough creativity to come up with something to fill the gap, oh well, guess that module isn't right for that DM.
DMs are stronger than Gods as far as game rules are concerned. They can do whatever the fuck they want. It's always been my impression that modules are mostly just there to help give the clueless people out there new directions.
My personal favorite explanation that I can think of right on the spot is that the bush smells good and attracts people to it, but when they rub up on it and touch the bush it ejects a druglike effect that is similar to being drunk. At which point the party goes and does a bunch of stuff they later have no memory of doing, like getting some temporary tattoos while being high as fuck. Perfect explanation for why nobody would remember the tattoos suddenly appearing if you ask me.
Or alternatively the bush has nothing to do with it and the guy telling you the bush is responsible is himself high as fuck and shouldn't be trusted.

@@ryangainey94 problem was was he was asked if he could run it for adventure league, which frowns heavily upon dms deviating from the modules.

@@raistlarn I'm guessing they want to sell modules so they have to stick to them like gospel?
Either way seems like a bit of a flawed approach.

@Danny BRITZMAN I never said it's about showing off, Danny. I just said a DM can invent something to fill it. Plot-oriented groups may want something more specific to the mystery. Other times you can just make up something fun that may amuse the group.

So the module is Champion of the People (spoilers follow). Almost all information is relayed through dialogue responses from characters, and there is no, “What really happened...” explanation, except for who the real bad guy is and his, “And I would have gotten away with it if it weren’t for you meddling kids!” monologue at the end (it a Scooby-Doo inspired module). But it’s pretty clear to me reading the module that the bad guy put the players in contact with the root to get undead to attack them. At one point he “shakes their hands and clasps their shoulders,” and then later on there’s a note that the players might see the, “mark on the exposed flesh of one or more characters (anyone that [villain] touched).” Then another character states that the mark attracts undead.

Piglet

Which one was that?
EDIT: It was the one where they go to New York.
krplus.net/bidio/YtGqY5aKc4mYhJQ

That episode is one of my favorites

Less the idea of Adventure League, and more with whomever is choosing those garbage modules.

@@MonkeyJedi99 I would say that's still a problem with the concept of Adventure League. Demand for more content means less quality control, less quality control means less quality modules, less quality modules means less quality modules to meet the demand... means poor quality modules getting used and run.
I understand why AL exists (to make money/be a jumping on point for new players/people without regular games for one reason or another) but that doesn't absolve it of genuinely being a terrible quality game that enforces a specific type of role play upon it members thus hindering them in non AL games.

@@BrandenLeavens If we were still living in the 1980's when all of D&D module writers would fit in a VW microbus, I could understand a shortage of good modules. There are now an estimated 3 million dungeon masters worldwide dungeonvault.com/how-many-dnd-players-are-there-worldwide/#:~:text=There%20are%20an%20estimated%203%20million%20tabletop%20Dungeon,as%20many%20players%20also%20DM%20a%20different%20group.
And we are to believe that WoC can't find better module writers just by asking for volunteers?

@@MonkeyJedi99 let's say you ask 12 terrible writers to write more modules.... do you get good modules? More peoplenisnthe problem not the solution, and all the old modules would need to be updated... why do that, people are gonna come for game anyway... what does it matter if the game they play is good... are they going to ask for a refund or shrug it off? Nothing gets fixed becuase there is no problem to fix, everything is working as intended.

@@BrandenLeavens If you ONLY ask terrible module writers, yes, you will bet terrible modules. Your argument assumes that all available module writers are terrible at their jobs, and they are the only ones who will be asked to write. There are people who are writing good mules all the time, and many of these people already give their stuff away for free, just to improve the experiences of others (and perhaps to get people to come back for the other modules they wrote for money). There is not a lack of good modules, there is a lack of effort to find and use those good modules on the part(s) of whomever runs this AL.
-
And if they don't get off their butts and actually look, new players, whose first experience could be a miserable AL module, will not stay in the hobby, and will not be buying any products like books, modules, minis, dice, terrain, and so on.

Wait. What if the _writer_ was under the influence of the false hydra? They couldn't tell the DM because they don't know!

When nothing becomes something?

@Bob Bobbertson and cosmo's line was a Seinfeld reference.

When the timer buzzes for the next session?

How do you know when it starts? and can it end if it never started? Time to contemplate existence again.

When we run out of nothing.

"...something is hinky in Barovia."

Nice. Did you come up with it?

@@thomastakesatollforthedark2231 well I did write this

@@monikakoide1302 so yes?

@@thomastakesatollforthedark2231 of course

@@monikakoide1302 wait. what is this. the titles of the drow pantheon.

Honestly thats why id consider the "spend 45 minutes here" a suggestion more than a rule. Let the players do some casual dicking around and when they seem done drop the Next Segment in.
Whats the worst that could happen? You finish early?

But that's the thing. The remaining 45-60 minutes were also dead ends. The entire module was a waste of time.

The only reason I could think of is that the module HAD to be two hours long so it needed to be packed with filler.

@@aguyhere7945 Pretty spot on, AL is supposed to be 2-4 hours long iirc, granted most of the ones I've read actually had the decency to contain an full short adventure without a dead stop at the end even if they're part of a series.

@@aguyhere7945 It's literally nothing but filler, though, because it goes absolutely nowhere.