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Calling for Cases (Patreon)

Published:
2023-10-16 21:26:50
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Hello! Bailiff Jake here to let you know the Supreme Crit is convening very soon. Please submit your brief (I beg!) case on this thread and we will bring you that good justice.

Comments

Anonymous

To the majestic and magnificent justices and the baby cockroach bailiff Jakeb (Do not share with justices: I secretly respect the bailiff and his body of comedic work, but do not want to loose any tie-breakers). I bring to you the case of "the Fatal and Failed Unconscious Wisdom Save" I am currently DM'ing a Curse of Strahd campaign with my usual group of five close friends (one of them my wife). The incident happened during an encounter with Strahd, that turned into an (in my opinion) exciting and cinematic battle, where darkness was cast in the middle of the battlefield. This meant that Strahd was attacking the bard (my wife) until she fell unconscious, in complete darkness, which only a few nearby perceptive characters were aware of. I knew that Strahd would easily be able to kill the bard on his turn of using the usual melee attacks, but I wanted to try something more mysterious, evil, and hopefully more devastating, that would give the party even more motivation to go after him. So I decided that Strahd would kidnap the unconscious body of the bard and kill or turn her when he was safe and alone (probably to do some dramatics theatricals with it at a later date). So I described the vampire using an action to Dimension Door (that he prepared beforehand), but realised that he could only bring "a willing creature". So I again narrated him using his charm ability (also an action) on the unconscious bard, describing it as a creepy and tender moment in middle of the confusing "storm" of fighting, as he held her in her arms and whispered in her ear. I had the bard roll a Wisdom Save that she luckily failed! As I described the wooshing of their vanishing out of sight, I immediately started doubting my own decision: Was I wrong for bending the rules of the dimension door and the charm effect for a more cinematic PC death? And maybe even worse: using 2 actions (dimension door and charm) to get my desired outcome? I beg for your righteous judgment, and will come clean to my players if you deem it the lawful and honorable thing to do.

Anonymous

The coupe de grace confession To the pious high priests of Dice Christ and the guy who reads the submissions. I prostate myself before thee with both a confession and a plea for clarity I recently started a side campaign alongside my longer running main campaign focusing on a smaller story in a bandit controlled town My 6 players were all excited to make new characters and each shared their concepts with me beforehand, I am a fairly lenient Dm and don’t get too upset with some whacky characters so I wasn’t overly concerned when one of my players came to me with their idea for a grung monk named pickles, pickles was supposedly an ascendant dragon monk who was raised by Dragonborn in a nearby monastery close to the town. Neat! However when the first session came around I was shocked to find out that they had decided to make pickles completely mute besides them saying their own name (Pokémon style) and had them frequently react to npcs by screaming and running around aimlessly, this was completely shocking behavior from an otherwise well behaved and unproblematic player so I was genuinely taken aback, in a moment of shameful anger and hesitation to confront the player themselves about their questionable behavior, I decided to simply murder the frog. During the 3rd encounter of the campaign Pickles ran head first into a pack of 6 or so angry cultists and I saw my opportunity to end the pickled plague once and for all, I had most of the cultist focus their attacks on pickles and in only about 2 rounds of combat dropped pickles to 0 hp, and here is where I believe I may have committed a grave dm sin, on one of the cultists turns (only 1 spot in initiative order until pickles had to roll a death save) I had them forgo attacking the rest of party and instead finish off pickles on the ground, however in a moment of hesitation and weakness I only had this strike deal 1 failed saving throw as I felt it unfair to have their death come down to a 50/50 coin-toss. Dice Christ must have felt my lack of faith because on the next turn of combat pickles rolled a nat 1 on their death save and permanently died regardless. Oh great priests was Dice Christ punishing me for unfair targeting of this player or simply giving me a guiding hand on what had to be done?

Anonymous

I bring my confession to the clergy of Dice Christ with outmost remorse. My sin, creating a year long campaign to resurrect my fallen Character. 7 years ago my dwarves fighter Muradin died fighting a shadow dragon due to some poor rolling and poorer choices. I decided to take on the DM mantle within the original world of the first campaign to give our DM a well deserved rest.. With the hidden intention of resurrecting my dear Muradin. 20ish sessions into the campaign came the moment to release the captured souls of adventures from the lair of the same shadow dragon, Muradin among them. The DM & players of the original campaign enjoyed the campaign and let me play my old character again.. But my original motives to DM were impure within the light of our Rolliness.. I throw myself to the mercy of dice Christ for my sin and pray the Clergy may absolve me of my Deception.

Anonymous

To the grand and mighty justices Brian, Emily and caldwell as well as that other guy. I present to you the case of the “Christmas truce” I as the dungeon master sent my players to hell, and they were caught in the middle of the blood war. Phoebe the bard had gotten the attention of both sides by rolling a natural 20. I told the party that wouldn’t stop the blood war, but they argued about a Christmas truce, I went with it because of the natural 20. Was I wrong to even let my players try and stop the blood war or was the “ Christmas truce” a right call? I leave my mercy to you

William Bowen

To the radiant judges and the necrotic but in a cool way bailiff Jim, I present the case of the Hold Person that ended a campaign. I joined an existing session about 6 months ago; all the other players and DM work together. I brought a female half orc paladin named Darcy but had to switch characters about a month back after the bladesinger in our group said "I wasn't getting their pirate vibe". The same player initially threatened my character with S.A. in the first session, which did not help. About a week ago we had a session during which we were stuck deep underground with no way out. I suggested bargaining with the queen of these people who had previously kidnapped and tortured our swashbuckling rogue. Since we had no other lead of escaping to the surface, and everyone's health and spells were low from fighting our way to her, my new character, a Dread Pirate Warlock Fighter decided to talk our way out. The bladesinger fought me on it but didn't have a better idea, so everyone went along. I succeeded in a brief roleplay and a persuasion check after which we all decided to help each other escape. Immediately after, the bladesinger player said "that took forever. Now that you're done with whatever that was, I cast wall of fire on the queen". We were aghast and when I asked him to stop and reconsider, he looks at me and said "too late! We're in this shit now!" So when it got to my turn I cast Hold Person on him to try to deescalate. He responded by screaming obscenities at me, the other players, and the DM. Then he picked up his things and stormed out. There has since been a debate with the group about whether to keep me or him. I offered to bow out and never come back, but this is far from the first outburst from this player and even one of the other players admitted she was going to try to cast a spell on the bladesinger to stop him anyway. So I ask: was i wrong to lose my temper and turn against a party member to save our only plot thread? Or should I have gone along with the party and doomed our PCs to live their lives underground forever? I throw myself at the mercy of the court. P.S. the DM stopped the session and threw the campaign on ice, admitting that this fight would have likely TPKd us anyway.

Anonymous

To the honorable court justices, and John Bailiff, I present to you the case of the martyr barbarian. In my first full campaign, I decided to play a character that fit very well into the DM’s created world. It was a pirate/sea faring themed campaign, so I was a Merfolk that was a runaway slave from a notorious pirate lord. In one session, we came across a village that had been taken over by pirates and used as a giant encampment for them. It turns out that it was under the control of the pirate lord, one of my character’s sworn enemies and his former master. The group discussed how we were going to get into the camp and free the villagers at length, with the other members (a bard, a Goliath Barbarian in Full Plate, a sorcerer and a cleric) wanted to stealth into the camp, find where the villagers were kept and free them. We had just failed to stealth through a castle, and time and time again the group had a lengthy conversation about stealthing and the Best Way to go about things, when the dm clearly wanted to just move the story along. I suggested we could technically just go through the front door, as I was wanted by these pirates and they’d probably escort us to the leader and we’d figure it out from there. They insisted on the stealth message, and seeing this opportunity for my character, I had to refuse. His enemy was right there, why wouldn’t he walk right in and demand to see him? Boy was a barbarian not a wizard. I did so, and as I thought, I was taken right to the leader and managed to learn super important information, and use myself as leverage to go through the camp unharmed. Meanwhile, my party failed again at stealthing and got ambushed by pirates, and I had to go save them in a deus ex barbarian-a. After the session the players told me they were upset that I had split the party and gone “rogue”. The dm expressed to me privately that he was thankful I made the decision to progress his story, and I got a really cool backstory moment out of it too. I ask the honorable judges, was I wrong to split the party? I am normally against it but in this case I knew my character would be stubborn. Should I have gone with the party’s plan or was I right to stick to my gut?

Zaxbeez

To the munificent Court and the fourth-best 8BBC guest [1], I bring before you a case of epilogue PvP. In a campaign I ran, my players had some tension throughout as one of the players played a Fire Genasi monk with anger issues (Using the addiction mechanics from Unsleeping City season 2). My player tried to get her anger under control, but Dice Christ must have really wanted the drama. Almost every time something triggered the monk, she would fail the save and explode in fire, damaging everything and everyone around her. The other players expressed frustration that this kept happening, and it eventually turned into the other characters (justifiably) not trusting the monk. We changed mechanics to be something less explosive, but it was still a narrative pain. About halfway through the campaign, we let the mechanic die off since it was inhibiting fun. Narratively, the monk got the plane that was feeding into her anger sealed off. A few months of sessions later, and the campaign was coming to a close. Barely scraping through the fight with a universe-devouring BBEG, the other 2 players assumed the mantles of gods as the monk had been taken to unconsciousness. I asked them what they wanted to do with their new powers, and one player restored the monk to 1 HP and put her on a mountaintop, saying she couldn’t be trusted with Godhood since she had caused so much destruction through her anger. Since this was during the epilogue narration, I didn’t know how to maneuver something good for the monk, and she really got shafted out of a satisfying ending of our year-long campaign. Justices, was I wrong to be so laissez-faire with the epilogue at the cost of one player’s satisfaction or should I have argued more for my monk and pushed for her to attain her goals? I humbly await your judgement. [1] Susanna Wolff (The Lore of Mortal Kombat), Nathan Yaffe (Caldwell’s Lore Corner: Skyrim), Jasper Willian Cartwright (The Vampire Express, Monster Mix-up), Jake something, who cares.

Anonymous

To the the highest court in the realms, and whomever the bailiff is this week... I'd ask you to look in the PHB and take a look at the rules for HP increase. The verbage says your hit dice plus your con modifier per level after first. To me that means at level five you would add your con modifier five times to what you roll. My friend (who is also a DM) thinks it's just once. I humbly ask for your ruling... Many thanks your honorships.

Anonymous

To the glorious Crit justices and the baby bailiff Jack. I bring forth the case of the Spell “Guard” shield. I played in a Decent into Avernus campaign where I was one of the more experienced players in the group. I decided to play a Cleric of Tyr to ensure the party had heals and support to survive the nine hells. The last opportunity we had to purchase items before our inevitable trip to the hells I was able to get myself the Spell guard shield. (The dm was pretty lax on item availability but depending on rarity the gold cost was increased). I had spent all of my remaining gold and even traded in a few lower magic items I had collected thus far in the campaign to get this item thinking it would be good to have advantage on saving throws against spells and magical effects so I could ensure I could heal/support the party. However once we were in the hells, battling fiends and demons alike, my shield became almost worthless. Each time a creature had us do a saving throw against being feared (like the Narzugon’s Terrifying Commanf or the Bulezau’s Rotting Presence) I would NOT have advantage as the DM ruled “it’s an ability, not a spell” I argued that since it was a magical effect it would still count, but he held true to his ruling. After a few minutes of back and forth I let the argument drop so as to allow everyone to keep playing. The party still ended up surviving the nine hells and finishing the campaign in the end, despite my turns being used for a couple team buffs before falling unconscious due to targeting the healer rules. But to this day I wonder if I should have fought harder to have my advantage or if I did the correct thing and roll with the DMs ruling. We still play to this day and even razz the DM about their ruling. I throw myself upon Tyr’s scales and await for the courts decision. PS: May Bahamut keep you and may the Baba Yaga not take you this night

Anonymous

To the honorable Supreme Crit Justices, and the on-again-off-again cake-loving Bailiff, I bring you the case of The Buzzkill Ex-Boss. I was DMing what was supposed to be a fun little one-shot for my partner, former co-worker, and now ex-boss (I hosted this game before quitting). My ex-boss proceeded to play into every terrible problem player edgy Rogue stereotype imaginable, i.e. main character syndrome, constantly going off alone, describing all their "moves" in an overly dramatic fashion, etc. One thing he kept doing that drove me absolutely bonkers was he would constantly roll dice unprompted, then tell me what he was doing. After trying to lure and kill an innocent commoner woman for no reason, then cover up his attempted murder by disguising himself as her, I could see the eyes of my two other players glaze over wondering what the hell was even happening. The session went entirely off a cliff not long after all thanks to our edge lord Rogue and we ended it on a sour note. I was only running this game as a favor to my ex-boss because he was accidentally excluded from a campaign that I'm currently running due to scheduling conflicts. But after this awful session, I'm feeling like I really dodged a bullet. Justices, I'm implore your wise and swift judgment. Should I have just rolled with the punches and put up with this problem player or was I vindicated in keeping him the hell away from my table?

Anonymous

To the honorable Supreme Crit Justices, and … (sigh) Jake. I bring to you the case of the spell-less Sorcerer. May it please the Court. My friends and I have been playing in a virtual campaign for about a year now, and it’s been mostly great! However, one of my friend’s roleplay decisions has started to cause some problems in the campaign. They play a Tiefling Sorcerer who is afraid of fire, and while that could definitely lead to some cool character moments, she refuses to engage with any conversation in-game about what’s going on. PC and NPC alike have tried to get the character to open up about it, but she gives one word answers or shrugs, and sometimes goes entire sessions barely saying a word in character. We had a fight with an evil wizard who summoned fire elementals and the character did nothing but run and hide nearly the entire combat, only throwing a single ray of frost at the start, and the party of 4 nearly TPK’d. Because she took mostly fire-based spells, she also has not used any high-level spells or any sorcery points at all and we’re now level 7, so this is becoming a real liability in every combat encounter. I asked my friend out of game what’s going on and how we can get her character more engaged, but she is happy with the character choices and said, ‘it’s only been a couple of months in-game, it would take somebody like this awhile to open up’ and left it at that. Am I right to be annoyed at the constant combat disadvantage and the inevitable TPK, or should I just let this ‘slow-burn’ roleplay decision run its course? I humbly prostrate myself in front of the court.

Anonymous

To the honorable supreme crit justices. I play a paladin in a multi planetary space adventure run by my dear friend of over 10 years. Our party discovered a shipment of an intergalactic drug that works like a modified haste potion. Another party member and I went through a lot of trouble to steal a crate of it. We asked our dm how much we got, he dm rolled a d100 then told us we had stolen 50 “uhh doses?” of the drug. I, being a paladin, thought I could use my immune to disease ability to take this modded haste powder without worrying about the homebrewed addiction condition it had on a failed con save. The first time I took the drug I Murph rolled my save but then said it was fine because I can’t be affected by addiction because I’m immune to disease. Our dm said the condition still worked and that I had disadvantage on all ability checks until someone casts greater restoration on me (which no one in the party even has high enough spell slots for.) Then our rogue, a former global public health major, said “but addiction is, like, definitely a disease though.” He said “I know it is in real life but I can’t just give you 50 free bonus action hastes Charlotte.” I was excited to have an awesome use for this normally super situational spell and feel Isaac should have just let himself get whomped. Am I right to feel like my claim to these “free” haste spells is by the book (of both dnd and medicine), or am I trying to animal facts my way out of the consequences of my actions and a failed save?

Anonymous

To the Dearest Beloved Enriched And Vibrant Members of the Court (and the vitamin deficient bailiff), I bring you the case of the undying barbarian. I was playing in an online game and one week when the DM was out, one of my fellow players (let's call him Chad) offered to DM a homebrew one shot he'd been wanting to run. Chad told us all to make level 20 characters and "expect to die". Our party, a warlock (Carol), a ranger (Tweedle), and a zealots barbarian (Cupcake) faced an ancient red dragon in its volcanic lair. While myself (Carol the warlock) and Tweedle did plenty of damage, we quickly went down within 4 rounds (we made our death saves but we'd used all our healing already), leaving Cupcake to face the dragon alone. Chad either forgot or didn't know that level 20 zealot barbarians cannot die while in a rage unless you do double their max damage in one round. Chad REALLY wanted that TPK, and Tweedle and I sat delightedly listening to him page through his book over the discord call to find some way to kill this barbarian. He failed to do so and after another 15 rounds Cupcake the Barbarian killed the dragon. Cupcake stated that he wanted to scoop up our bodies and run them to safety and find a healer, smacking himself in the face every round to keep himself in a rage to keep from dying. However, Chad decided that as the dragon died, the volcano exploded, and said Cupcake had no way to outrun the blast. Did we take it too far with the shenanigans? Should we have allowed him to kill us all in an easier fashion? Or was he in the wrong for insisting on a TPK after Cupcake defeated his dragon? I await your always fair judgement! (For additional context, none of us know each other in real life, and we had been playing together for a year. Chad argued with our regular DM about everything, and took around 30 minutes every single time it was his turn, so I can't say that any of us held him in particularly high esteem. I never got actual stats on the dragon so I'm not positive it was an ancient red dragon. I know it was red and the biggest version)

Anonymous

To the dentally hygienic Judges and Members of the Court, and the cavity-riddled bailiff who definitely doesn't floss, I bring you the case of the fish out of water gone wrong I was running a game made for new players in order to get my sister (G) and friend (F) who were new to DND a fun first experience. I had three other players (N, H, and M) in the game who wanted to play and were aware of my intended difficulty level. I knew my sister wanted to play in the sci-fi homebrew world I was working on and none of the other players particularly cared what the setting was, so I decided to make a fish out of water type story where the PCs were all from a typical fantasy setting plane but had been transported to the sci-fi one without their knowledge. The only catch? They landed in a Westworld-like theme park so the setting was only revealed gradually to them. The bard, sorcerer, rogue, and 1st paladin (played by F, M, G, and N respectively) all played well together and had a lot of fun rp moments, but H (playing the 2nd paladin) practically refused to do anything other than kill those who got in her way. H claimed to be a good alignment and often justified these actions by saying "my character doesn't understand the world she's in" in a spiteful manner to me, but that never sat right with me since the world was populated with common races that H's character would absolutely have contact with. This behavior only got worse and eventually made me dread running the game every week for fear of which random NPC H's murderous paladin would dispatch next. Other PCs came to me on a few occasions asking if I could simply kill this character off, and I did try to do so but H managed to get their character out of the way, causing the 1st paladin to die instead. Am I judging this player's character too harshly? Should I have been more clear with my PCs about wanting a fish out of water story? Or is H being a problem player by going so consistently against everything the party and GM wanted to do? I ask you this.

Anonymous

Fathers (and Mother?) please forgive me for I have sinned under Dice Christ and I seek to repent. A few years back I was DMing my first campaign. The players got caught in a battle with a towns guard for reasons that could be a court case. The party’s fighter (who was mostly innocent) went down in the altercation and started rolling death saving throws. First roll, Nat 1. 2 failed death saving throws. 2nd roll Nat 20. In my new DM ignorance we marked that as 2 successes instead of him getting up with 1 hp. His next roll was a fail and the character died. It wasn’t until years later that I learned how the proper ruling and I have felt a guilt on my conscious since. The campaign lasted a few sessions more but never officially ended What should I do to make up for this folly?

Anonymous

I preface this by saying I will be at the LA live show 💙 Dearest esteemed justices and the once baby, but obviously now in his rebellious teenage phase, bailiff - I present the case of the Twitch Chat Caper. Thrice monthly my friends and I stream our campaign on Twitch. We had a player who advised the group they would not be playing that week so we proceed crawling through a homebrew ancient baddies underground castle when low and behold the player that couldn't make it appears in the Twitch chat. Not just a drop in and hi, but full on playing their character and trying to RP decisions through chat. Our DM actively ignored the player trying to steal the show in chat and kept on with the present players. I ask the court to rule over this quandary, should the DM have acknowledged the backseat player in the Twitch chat or were they right to ignore it and keep moving on?

Anonymous

Dear beloved and honorable Justices and that dude Jake. I come to you not with a confession nor a case to present. But merely a humble request. As I have just listened to the tortle tank episode I must be honest and say that I am currently playing a gnome bard and I also drive an f150. And I sbaolutely think the d20 truck nuts idea was amazing and if it's not already a thing please, I beg you to make them so I can purchase these amazing and hilarious nuts for my truck. Thank you for your time

Anonymous

Attention naddpoles, I am no longer able to attend the Denver live show, seat is in the front Orchestra section. If anyone is interested message me, going to sell at regular value I bought for.

Alex Cavanaugh Music

To the illustrious supreme crit judges and the painfully ordinary bailiff. No case, I just wanted Jake to have to read another insult <3

Anonymous

To the honorable judges and my favorite bailiff. As a dm I have heard your opinions about crits before and I have a situation where my players argued with my ruling on a nat 20. The pacifist bard of the group had failed their persuasion check on a friendly npc who was going to kill a bandit camps leader. So the warlock/paladin got a nat 20 on a deception check that the bandit leader was his dad. The npc then got confused and attacked the warlock/paladin but did not kill him. The npc then left upset. Was I in the wrong for not giving them a more favorable outcome?

Sugar Bear

To the noble Clergy of dice christ! i come before yall not with a confession, but with a question because no matter what y’all decide im still gonna keep doing it. So i have a pretty common learning disability called dyscalculia which makes even the simplest of math problems embarrassingly difficult and uncomfortably long to figure out especially during combat. Unfortunately im also cursed with a pretty bad case of Murphism and can go to whole 4 hour sessions without rolling above a 10. So to combat my awful math abilities i’ve started using Dnd Beyond to roll my dice and it will automatically add up all my damage or proficiency bonuses. However i have also noticed now that im using an online roller im rolling astronomically better! So i ask the church, am i just being blessed by dice christ or have i finally killed god with my machine?

EmperorGreed

More of a Dice Christ Confession: To the vaunted clerics of Dice Christ, and Jake who claims to have status in the church but if he has to say it does he *really*, I bring you a tale of accidental magic theft. I am playing as a paladin in the late stages of a Curse of Strahd campaign with my family, dm'ed by my fiancee. I thought i had been keeping good track of my spell slots despite my historic inability to keep track of anything in any circumstance, but my fiancee has occasionally been surprised at the number of spell slots I have, and now playing as a paladin in Baldur's Gate 3 - where a computer unfailingly documents my spell slots - I'm finding I have a lot less than I remember, and I suspect I may have been unwittingly cheating for years. Holy Clergy and also Tucker's girlfriend's sidepiece, how might I atone for this inadvertent magical tax fraud?

Anonymous

To the cutie patootie judges and Jake I bring you the case of the healing human I play in a home game with a few friends and my younger brother as the Dm. We have just recently reached 20th level and my friend who is playing a human gained a special magic item that allows him to heal when he takes radiant damage. I, an Oath of redemption paladin, have the ability to “Rebuke the Violent” as my Channel divinity, according to RAW I can choose an “attacker” who deals damage to someone other than me within 30ft and they make a wisdom save and on a fail take full or success take half damage of the attack they did, but in radiant damage. Is my Dm right in saying that I cannot use this to heal my friend? Please punish me or my brother however you feel fit I lay myself before the court

Anonymous

NOTE: I will be at the Los Angeles Live Show if you're accepting cases for that now! If it may please the court, (specifically Supreme Crit Justices Murphy, Axford and Tanner, I’m not particularly concerned about how that guy Jake feels about it) I present unto you the case of Snake Dick Shenanigans. This was back during my first real D&D campaign, we had made it to the end of our adventure and were infiltrating the Yuan-Ti cult headquarters to face the final boss. On our way there, we found a door in the guard’s section and upon listening, determined that there was someone showering inside. This led to a lengthy discussion at the table about Yuan-Ti genitals, specifically what a snake dick would look like and whether it would just be a second, smaller snake attached to their body. We contemplated this conundrum for so long that our DM eventually announced that we had been having this conversation in character and that our shouting about snake dick had attracted the attention of the other guards, as well as our now very uncomfortable showering enemy, and we ended up in a combat encounter. The whole thing worked out fine and we went on to defeat the boss, but I ask you: did our DM have the right to turn our out-of-character shenanigans into in-character stupidity, or is it our right as players to ponder the questions of the universe free from consequence? Shea (like the hot druid)

Anonymous

(I will be at the LA live show and and submitting for that if you are accepting those cases now) To the illustrious Justices and the oft-maligned Bailiff, I present the case of the traumatized younglings. My friends and I were playing in a Star Wars 5e campaign in which we each built expressly good-aligned force-sensitive characters ages 16-18. My character was an orphan who was a self-titled Jedi and defender of the innocent, and the other PCs were similarly pure of heart. Our first session was roleplay heavy, comedic, and featured fun, nonlethal combat. In the second session we were immediately descended upon by a police gunship for no discernable reason, and trapped in a small hangar where we were forced to use projectile power tools as guns to defend against the gunship that fired at us comfortably from way outside any of our ranged abilities. We were then also attacked by feral dogs and boxed in by two squads of stormtroopers at the only exit. All of these enemy forces were in no way related, had been given no reason to hunt us, and yet all worked together to try and kill us from all sides. Each time the DM narrated a policeman dying at our hands, I sank a little bit more, and when he gruesomely described the way our bolt gun killed one of the dogs all I could Imagine my character doing was crying. This was an insane battle for our small party of nonviolent third-level teenagers, and I had to dissociate from my character in order to not feel absolutely miserable. The rest of the party was visibly upset as well. When it was over we collectively told the DM that it felt unnecessarily brutal, and he responded by saying “It seems like you guys were looking for something fun and light. I was thinking more along the lines of the movie Logan.” This is not something he had previously so much as even hinted at. This long standing group has not played together since this session of nearly a year ago. Should we have respected the DM’s vision for the campaign and just rolled with it? Or were we justified in our complaints about the way this session was run? I humbly await your ruling.

yumehop (no. 1 ol' cobb fan)

Dear court and dearly beloveds (Jake included!!) Is there an alternative to stun? My bf in our long running curse of strahd campaign played a ranger. We were up against a vampire monk and a drider artillerist who had stun mechanics. I think he spent like 3 minutes on his turn, then had to sit out for 40 or so minutes as he got stunned 3 rounds in a row. It's not fun because it makes him lose engagement with the game a little. Would love to hear y'all's thoughts.

Anonymous

To the venerable justices Axford, Murphy, and Tanner, and the vehement Bailiff whatshisname. May it please the court: Your honor and members of the jury, I represent today myself in both the prosecution and defense of this case. I run an urban magic campaign set at a college campus. For one of our arcs my players had to investigate a poltergeist attack at a fraternity party. Offhandedly I mentioned they saw someone vaping in the stairwell (as one will do at a college party.) Eventually it came time to investigate an obvious summoning ritual complete with chalk circle, candles, and ceremonial ruins. Still, my players decided to chase down the girl who was vaping in the stairwell, proceeding to spend two sessions in hot pursuit of a non-relevant NPC. They were convinced she caused a summoning with the vapors in her pen. In their words, they believed it was a “throw away lead for the villain.” I repeatedly tried to guide my players down the correct path by inventing more poltergeist attacks with repeated clues to gently push them down the right path but they systematically ignored the victims in favor of the vapester. Many innocents died in this saga. They simply did not care. After two sessions of trying to gently direct them I had to pause the game and very frankly tell them that the answer to this arc was not sick vape tricks. It was the summoning circle of chalk and candles that they found within fifteen minutes the first session. Was I wrong in breaking character to put them back on track? Or should I have succumb to their nicotine dreams and changed the mystery to be about juuling? On one hand I recognize this could be railroading for the plot. On the other hand, ghost summoning by vape trick is stupid and they had wasted two sessions and multiple hours of my life despite giving them ample clues. To this day I can’t decide if they were fucking with me or if they were convinced they were right. Honorable justices please advise.

Andrew portillo

(Los Angeles) the case of Bastard Sword Backstory Hey judges... Jake OMG hi! That a new shirt? Looks great, anyway I bring before the court the case of the bastard sword backstory. My friends and I started a Pathfinder 2e campaign, but our GM has been a little strict about about lore accuracy. Before our first session, myself and the other players were discussing our characters. I'm playing a Magus Grippli(frog people) from the Mwangi jungle. I was sharing the backstory of how I found my sword. I said that my little frog man found it while going fishing in the swamp, and coming across an ancient battlefield, the sword was among the wreckage, so he kept it. It was a small inconsequential head cannon for my weapon, that would probably never even be brought up in the campaign. My GM however said that no battles would have ever taken place in the area I originate from, so this backstory wouldn’t make sense. We began arguing about this, and almost got into a bit of a shouting match. He said he wasn’t going to just change the lore to accommodate this backstory. Ultimately for the sake of peace, I acquiesceted and settled on saying that my character found it at a store and bought it. Was I asking too much? Or was my GM being too strict? I lay myself and my little frog man's sword at the courts feet, and await your judgement.

Anonymous (edited)

Comment edits

2023-11-01 04:56:15 To the wise justices and aspiring cake guy, Jake, I present to you the case of the Kitchen Hire Misfire. I play in an online homebrew campaign that is set in Waterworld, a flooded, post-apocalyptic setting. Our group of PCs own a ship, where we employ several NPCs whom we befriended early in the campaign to keep things sailing smoothly. Our DM has — for the last seven years — given us shit for collecting and utilizing too many NPCs during campaigns. Thus, in this campaign we have made a point of leaving our crewmates behind during off-ship missions and not heavily involving them in decision-making to keep our DM happy. On a whim, we recently asked our crew hire a cook for the ship. The following week, our NPCs presented us with their choice, Chef Blake. For a price of 50 gold per week, Chef Blake would make us delicious food that would give us an ongoing +1 bonus to our constitution scores. This seemed like a reasonable enough deal, but Chef Blake seemed increasingly intent on turning our NPCs into his own personal kitchen brigade and renovating our ship to include kitchen “essentials” such as a pizza oven. While it started as a joke, our NPCs also began referring to Chef Blake as their captain in interpersonal interactions. My fellow players and I became uncomfortable with this situation and collectively decided that maybe we should fire Chef Blake. When we tried to do so, however, our NPC crew became despondent. All of them expressed that Chef Blake gave them a sense of dignity and meaning and that we had been neglecting and underpaying them. Our party became frustrated, unclear on what exactly our DM — who was clearly enjoying himself — wanted from these interactions. Once several players left the Zoom call, our DM seemed to realize that maybe he'd gone too far, and very expertly improvised that Chef Blake was an ill-intentioned fiend that had charmed our crew. Justices, I humbly ask — did our DM go too far in making us feel like awful employers, or should our party have embraced Chef Blake and made an effort to placate our salty NPCs?
2023-10-29 02:38:12 To the wise justices and aspiring cake guy, Jake, I present to you the case of the Kitchen Hire Misfire. I play in an online homebrew campaign that is set in Waterworld, a flooded, post-apocalyptic setting. Our group of PCs own a ship, where we employ several NPCs whom we befriended early in the campaign to keep things sailing smoothly. Our DM has — for the last seven years — given us shit for collecting and utilizing too many NPCs during campaigns. Thus, in this campaign we have made a point of leaving our crewmates behind during off-ship missions and not heavily involving them in decision-making to keep our DM happy. On a whim, we recently asked our crew to hire a cook for the ship. The following week, our NPCs presented us with their choice, Chef Blake. For a price of 70 gold per week, Chef Blake would make us delicious food that would give us an ongoing +1 bonus to our constitution scores. This seemed like a reasonable enough deal, but Chef Blake seemed increasingly intent on turning our NPCs into his own personal kitchen brigade and renovating our ship to include kitchen “essentials” such as a pizza oven. While it started as a joke, our NPCs also began referring to Chef Blake as their captain in interpersonal interactions. My fellow players and I became uncomfortable with this situation and collectively decided that maybe we should fire Chef Blake. When we tried to do so, however, our NPC crew became despondent. All of them expressed that Chef Blake gave them a sense of dignity and meaning and that we had been neglecting and underpaying them. Our party became frustrated, unclear on what exactly our DM — who was clearly enjoying himself — wanted from these interactions. Once several players left the Zoom call, our DM seemed to realize that maybe he'd gone too far, and very expertly improvised that Chef Blake was an ill-intentioned fiend that had charmed our crew. Justices, I humbly ask — did our DM go too far in making us feel like awful employers, or should our party have embraced Chef Blake and made an effort to placate our salty NPCs?

To the wise justices and aspiring cake guy, Jake, I present to you the case of the Kitchen Hire Misfire. I play in an online homebrew campaign that is set in Waterworld, a flooded, post-apocalyptic setting. Our group of PCs own a ship, where we employ several NPCs whom we befriended early in the campaign to keep things sailing smoothly. Our DM has — for the last seven years — given us shit for collecting and utilizing too many NPCs during campaigns. Thus, in this campaign we have made a point of leaving our crewmates behind during off-ship missions and not heavily involving them in decision-making to keep our DM happy. On a whim, we recently asked our crew to hire a cook for the ship. The following week, our NPCs presented us with their choice, Chef Blake. For a price of 70 gold per week, Chef Blake would make us delicious food that would give us an ongoing +1 bonus to our constitution scores. This seemed like a reasonable enough deal, but Chef Blake seemed increasingly intent on turning our NPCs into his own personal kitchen brigade and renovating our ship to include kitchen “essentials” such as a pizza oven. While it started as a joke, our NPCs also began referring to Chef Blake as their captain in interpersonal interactions. My fellow players and I became uncomfortable with this situation and collectively decided that maybe we should fire Chef Blake. When we tried to do so, however, our NPC crew became despondent. All of them expressed that Chef Blake gave them a sense of dignity and meaning and that we had been neglecting and underpaying them. Our party became frustrated, unclear on what exactly our DM — who was clearly enjoying himself — wanted from these interactions. Once several players left the Zoom call, our DM seemed to realize that maybe he'd gone too far, and very expertly improvised that Chef Blake was an ill-intentioned fiend that had charmed our crew. Justices, I humbly ask — did our DM go too far in making us feel like awful employers, or should our party have embraced Chef Blake and made an effort to placate our salty NPCs?

Anonymous

To the unelected justices Murphy, Axford, and Tanner and the properly appointed Bailiff J-Dawg I bring before the court a pivotal case that will set precedent about the right of self determination. While DM’ing a homebrew campaign, the players found themselves trying to stop a ritual meant to sever the planar tethers to the Shadowfell. One player, a paladin, attacked a cultist focused on the ritual and ‘marked’ him, a feature that allows the paladin to deal damage if the target attempts to attack someone other than the paladin. On the cultist’s turn he continued focusing on the ritual and the paladin argued that he should get to deal damage. I clarified that the cultist was not making an attack action, but instead still focusing on the ritual. The paladin said that because the ritual was going to damage the universe, it constituted an attack. I explained that’s not how the rule works, and even if it did, the paladin would STILL not do damage as he would be considered a target of the attack as the “universe” includes the paladin. This argument went in circles for 5 minutes until I asked the paladin if he was part of the universe to which he replied “NO!” I ruled that the paladin winked out of existence and the fight continued without him. He left the table, never to rejoin. I would’ve allowed him to come back at any time, no questions asked, but he was unwilling. Years later, my group still sometimes sees a wayward paladin drifting through the void during planar travel. I still wonder, was I wrong to allow him to self determine his existence? Or are some laws of the universe immutable and unaffected by the force of will?