Having allowed Zird to Zird up the demon protection barrier outside the White Dome of Fairmire, your plucky group of adventurers is now forced into yet another dicey situation. A large group of demons can be seen rushing their way. Great. Wonderful. Demons will get what they have coming for them. Roll for initiative.
The adventure continues with Titus Harper (Tim Lanning), Thom the Dragonborn (Mike Bachmann), Aludra (Jennifer Cheek), Jaela (Nika Howard) and your Dungeon Master (Michael DiMauro). Don’t forget to follow our editor Steph Kingston (@stephokingston)!
I love all the referances you guys include that I get!!! Mass Effect, Dragon Age (DORIAN!) and the Welcome to Night Vale episode (which was totally the best ever!) Most referances in regular life go over my head so its amazing to actually understand whats going on. <3
I am still catching up.. obvi, but these last few combat episodes have me cringing even more than usual. The weird mix of 4 and 5e combat rules aren’t doing anyone but the DM a service here. I can’t stand how the DM always mixes player knowledge (DM) with character knowledge(monsters). It is really tough to listen to Michael bend the monsters actions based on what abilities the characters have. He has always done this in combat which is his prerogative (he is the DM!), but it really makes the combat very unrealistic even for an imaginary setting. Like how all of the monsters just “know” to only attack the defender when they’re marked, and combat maneuvers that only intelligent races would know (flanking etc.) are applied to pretty much every monsters knowledge. I get meta gaming at times where it benefits the story and the podcast, but c’mon man that’s no way to treat your players! – and it doesn’t make it realistic for the audience. If a BBEG is a mastermind and super intelligent sure.. make him have all of the combat knowledge in the world, but otherwise its a little ridiculous. You have to think like an NPC would not like a DM with all of the player and character knowledge would. So far that is one of my only complaints about the podcast. Especially at these higher levels when the players are constantly missing abilities they could be using (pretty much all of alludra’s defender abilities come to mind, and also Thom’s extra 1d6 for being bloodied constantly that he never uses). They are missing out on a ton of damage and useful tactics already man.. just saying. No need to railroad the combat by using all of the DM knowledge to punish them in combat. They are punishing themselves enough! 😀 – Also the no-grid thing is only benefiting the DM at this point in the podcast. Several of the players (Jayla, and Harper) have AoE abilities that would hit waaaay more than what thrifty is saying. Also the movement, flanking, etc. are pretty much being used to the DMs advantage with the players being blind. I’ve had to shut off the podcast at several points lately and just breathe because it is so irritating to hear the players getting reamed by the DMs weird play-style. As a DM myself it just confuses me as what the goal is, but as a player its infuriating to see someone have a double standard on the rules numerous times during battle.
-BTW the RP is all great and I love the podcast. I’ve been listening from Episode 1 but it’s taking time to catch up since you guys have so many damn years of podcasting now – congrats btw.
-P.S if you read this I still love you thrifty and I think you are an overall really good DM which is why the combat in the episodes around this time are making me so angry! lol
-P.P.S I know I sound like I am yelling at something that is really old and doesn’t matter. STFU – I love all of you guys. Keep doing the podcasts. They are fantastic. Everyone has great chemistry and you have really helped scratch the DnD itch I’ve been having for many years since my best friend and DM committed suicide over 12 years ago. You guys make me laugh and happy and angry all at the same time.
Keep it going.
P.P.P.S – When I finally catch up I’m sure you guys won’t be reading reviews on the podcast anymore, but I will review it anyways when I get caught up.