6 Legendary GMs and their Epic Failures

Comments · 926

• TH

  @theDMLair · 1 year ago · pinned

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• VE

  @VestigialLung · 1 year ago

  On a super inconsequential note, the fact that Mercer, after over a decade DMing for this table, to say nothing of all of the years before that, clearly still hasn’t learned the rule of “run your NPC names past one 13 year old before saying them at the table or at a minimum say them out loud to yourself a few times” will never not amuse me. It’s hardly consequential, but it somehow blindsides him every time he writes a character name that’s like half a syllable away from something really lewd, and the table loses their shit laughing.

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• T3

  @T3hIluvatar · 1 year ago (edited)

  As for Brennan&apos;s &quot;roll for everything&quot; mistake, it&apos;s a common one, but easily fixed. If you need the players to succeed at something to push the story forward, but still want there to be a possibility of failure (which is great for drama), make the failure state a complication instead. They succeed at opening the locked door, but they alert the guards. They succeed at extracting the necessary information, but the NPC turns hostile because of it, or some of the extra information is incorrect, possibly leading to problems down the line. It&apos;s boring when the failure state is &quot;nothing happens&quot;. It&apos;s always better for stuff to happen, even if it&apos;s bad mixed with good.

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• JA

  @JazzyGecko41 · 1 year ago

  “Alexandria Unlimited” LoL <br>We do indeed all make mistakes

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• AR

  @ArtemisRain4731 · 1 year ago

  I feel like it needs to be stated that the professionals like Brennan, Matt and Aabria are not playing a normal game of DnD in the instances we see them. They and those that are playing with them are also PERFORMING for us, so sometimes there needs to be slight instances of player agency spoken for and roll trains so the audience can have a good time and not get bored, progress the story, and get information that makes us go AAAAAWWWWWW SHIIIIIIITTTT. I doubt Brennan gives info out on bad rolls in his home games, but these games are a production, so sometimes they need to railroad so the audience stays engaged.

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• II

  @IIIWITHOUTaNAMEIII · 1 year ago

  I think the issue with problem players is, they are your friends first in most of our cases. <br>Most of us are no professional DMs who are being paid to play. It’s easy to „just kick“ a player if you don’t really know them. <br><br>I think that was a problem at critical role in the beginning. They didn’t want to kick a friend, before it got too bad. And that is the hardest thing for most of us as well. <br><br>It’s necessary in some cases, but to walk the line is not fun.

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• SI

  @sitnamkrad · 1 year ago

  I&apos;m a little surprised that the mistake with Matt Colville was the discontinuation of the chain and not the introduction. <br>For those who don&apos;t know, &quot;The Chain of Acheron&quot; is a mercenary company. The first part of this campaign was all about this company biting off more than they could chew, and failing badly because of this. This was planned at least to such a degree (as stated by Matt himself) that some players were in on this and were playing effectively throwaway characters to later be replaced by their actual ones. This resulted in the players not in the know, to stay and fight in an encounter they were meant to run away from, while the throwaway characters made their heroic last stand sacrifice to give them time to escape. Some players were frustrated because of the difficulty, others because precious time and resources were wasted on a pre-determined outcome. &quot;The chain&quot; was meant to fall. The campaign was about re-building it. The players were effectively playing the intro cutscene, while only half of them were really aware of this. Matt talked about this in one of his &quot;behind the scenes&quot; video. Something he made for many of his sessions

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• ST

  @stateofhibernation · 1 year ago

  To my knowledge with critical role, they were all friends prior to the stream turning their home game into a big online hit. I can understand not wanting to immediately kick your friend out putting the business first. At the end of the day it was the right choice.

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• JE

  @jeremydurdil556 · 1 year ago

  <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YW2uke_aV3Q&amp;t=139">2:19</a> Video starts here

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• ON

  @oneill214 · 1 year ago

  Thank you, Luke, for teaching us that we are human and that it&apos;s natural to fail in order to grow. Mistakes teach us how to learn.

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• YA

  @YawdroGaming · 1 year ago

  There&apos;s a fine line of critiquing vs. roasting but I think you nailed it here. A lot of creators just seem to love railing on these pro DMs, but you offered a much appreciated analysis of those problems that all DMs and players have seen or experienced. Great video!

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• SI

  @SilverScribe85 · 1 year ago

  Before I got into Critical Role, Brennan&apos;s content is what got me into watching online D&amp;D content. In all the campaigns I&apos;ve seen him do, I&apos;ve had ZERO problems with how he DMs his campaigns.<br><br>To be frank, I often found HIS work more entertaining than Matt&apos;s on Critical Role; mainly for the fact the worlds Brennan creates aren&apos;t anything like we&apos;re used to in D&amp;D

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