Cases for Dungeon Court Live

Highly overpowered justices of the Court and lowley peasant-statted bailiff. I come to thee with the case of my best Friend and his unbalanced lonely-wolf-fighter. First off, sorry to inform justice Murphy that ending the friendship will not be a viable solution in this case. Eventhough he might feel enticed to suggest it. My friend and I have played together in many homecampaigns. Sometimes I was the DM, sometimes he was. Now we want to additionally join an online group that a friend of ours plays in. The DM of the group was so nice to let us join into her ongoing and well-developed level-4-campaign. I couldn’t be at the session his PC was introduced, because I was on a long-planned bachelor part. But he told me about what happened during his introduction and oh Man! The party met him in a bar, wearing a hood and ignoring everyone until he realized that his magic detector - which is supposed to lead him towards his McGuffin - went wild near them. So he opened up his trench, drew his weapons and threatenend them… I thought that sounded like a weird way to make new friends but wasn’t sure of surprised either. Apparently he also threatened to trash the pub they were in. But what really left me speechless for a while was when he received that the party actually decided to bend to his will and work on a deal for his McGuffin. Not because he had great arguments or an intriguing personality, oh no Sir. He rather reveiled to them that he was well equipped and double their level. That’s something that he had apparently talked about with the DM. I know he always enjoyed playing the lone wolf badass kind of characters and he seems genuinely excited about this one. But I worry that the rest of the established party might not enjoy being outshined by this Ryan-Urphy-kind of creation. I thought about asking the DM if she has any plan on how to keep the fights feeling fair to everyone. But on the other hand my character hasn’t even been introduced and I don’t want to enter the table for the first time, immediately doubting the DM’s decision for her own campaign. What say you? Should I try and bring the topic up or just let my friend have his edgy Vigo-Experience, now that he finally has the chance to? I humbly await your fair judgement.

All for one and one for all Robs

Rob's Wit

Having fun is the most important tenant of all

Tammie Foster

You're Rob. I'm Rob. We're all Rob.

Bent Vent

How many of these scenarios are now written by ChatGPT? Once upon a time, in a land of fantasy and adventure, two players sat around a table with their Dungeons and Dragons characters. One player, named Sarah, had created a fierce warrior with long, flowing red hair. The other player, named Jake, had created a cunning rogue with short, spiky black hair. As they began their adventure, they encountered a group of bandits. Jake's rogue quickly snuck up behind the bandits and began picking their pockets, while Sarah's warrior charged in with her sword drawn. The bandits were quickly defeated, but as they were looting their bodies, Jake and Sarah began to argue. "Hey, why is your warrior's hair red?" Jake asked. "What do you mean? It's just a cosmetic choice," Sarah replied. "But it doesn't make sense for a warrior to have red hair. Warriors are supposed to be fierce and intimidating, not flashy and attention-grabbing," Jake said. Sarah was taken aback. "I didn't realize my character's hair color was such a big deal. I just thought it looked cool." "Well, it's not cool. It's immersion-breaking and it ruins the realism of the game," Jake said. The argument continued for a few more minutes, until the dungeon master stepped in. "Okay, you two, let's focus on the adventure at hand. The color of a character's hair is not important, and it doesn't affect the game in any way. Let's just move on and have fun." And with that, the argument was settled, and the two players put the matter behind them and continued with their adventure. But from that day on, Sarah made sure to choose more realistic hair color for her characters, while Jake learned not to be so serious and let players have their fun.

nbsgamer

To the Esteemed Judges and Honored Bailiff of the Highest Court of these lands. I submit the following case: the Digital Dice Devil. I make this confession in hopes for absolution by Dice Christ. While DMing a Spelljammer campaign for my three players, the party was attempting to escape a global catastrophe during session one, as the entire planet started to break apart. With two players down, one of them ~digitally~ rolled three 6's in a row, failing their death saves. Hating to see a character go down during session 1, I chimed in saying that spotty wifi might have caused the odd 666 rolls and suggested that they reroll physically. The player's next roll was a natural 20, which I rewarded by bringing the player back up in place of two death saves. Was I right to step in and save this character against the Dice Devil, or have I stepped from Dice Christ's light by not following through with the character's death?

Rob's Wit

TYRANNY, overthrow the party

I wanted to go so bad, but couldn’t find a way to fit in my schedule. Hope we do more live D&D courts!

Sean

My humble greetings to the honorable judges and the dutiful bailiff. I bring you the case of the Demon Deal Gone Wrong: my DM, who is also my partner, took away a critical hit. We were fighting a dragon and were hurt badly. The dragon was looking pretty hurt and my character crit for 4d8 plus 2d6 plus 2d4 of damage. At that moment, the DM decides to trigger a deal my character made with a demon. I had no real knowledge of how it worked, I just “owed a moment of my time.” At the DMs discretion, my character is teleported to the demons location for that moment, and then teleported back. My crit is nullified and my turn ends. To further put salt in the wound my DM admits he was going to teleport me earlier but forgot. While I understand my character made a bad deal, I think it’s a horrendous crime to deliberately take away a crit during an important moment, especially when my DM agreed from previous rulings that taking one away is awful. I ask you, did I get what I deserve, or did my DM wrongfully take away an important crit from me and my party? Added note, this hasn’t put any stress on the relationship, and we have agreed to honor your judgement.

The show was INCREDIBLE. The cases were great and seeing them interact with the audience was amazing!

Zippidi Skibidi

How was the show for those who could make it? My partner got sick so missed it.

Forgive me Dice Christ, for I have sinned. Also, WILBUR. For my first campaign, I played an echo-knight, ancestral barbarian multiclass that took hella advantage of using my echo to proc sentinel on attacks of opportunity to stop enemy combatants from advancing on my party. Often, I'd stand among the squishier party members and have my echo on the frontline, or strategically placed to swap positions with it. I'd leave the echo in a doorway to bottleneck the baddies while we ran ahead. I'd leave the echo in a different room to have a quick escape. BUT, several sessions later, after reading the echo feature text - I noticed it said that if your echo is ever more than 30ft away at the end of your turn, it disappears. Highest Septons of the Crtical Faith, I must confess that my echo was often more than 30ft from my character. In self-flagellation, without alerting party to my trasngressions, I asked my DM to kill off my character - am I right with our Dicey Diety?

To the greatest travel court and entertaining jester Amir. I bring the case of a unresolved broken party. The important characters are myself, DM and the bard Jack. I was new to the group and signed up at the start of a dungeon crawl. I made good friends in and out of game with Jack. When we left the Dungeon Jack had lost his voice and we went on a quest to get it back. This took 2 months of session (once a week), and during this time I gave Jack magic items to help him and even killed my idol by saving Jack’s life. At the end of the quest Jack sold the magic items given to him for money and clothes. This resulted in me not trusting and being antagonistic to his character. I wanted to resolve it in character. But never got the chance due to the campaign ending due to Covid. I talked to him out of character asking why he sold the items and he said “I didn’t need them anymore and I could get better stuff.” I ask was I being petty over the loot or did Jack pull off the best heist of the game. I await to hear the sentence in person tonight. Thank you.

To the most humble supreme Crit Justices Axford Murphy and Tanner, and the super smart and intelligent and kind… what’s his name? Oh right, Bailiff Jack, I seek a judgement for myself. About 3 years ago, I played dnd with my dad (this is when I first started playing). While playing with my dad, him the DM, I would continually fudge my rolls. If it was a nat 1, I’d say something better. I sometimes look back at this and feel awful for it. The thoughts still haunt me to this day. I feel I have sinned against Dicechrist, yet Dicechrist will not punish me. I seek forgiveness and punishment for my crimes of fudging the dice.

Rue

WILBUR May it please the court, the prestigious Justices, and the prevaricating bailiff, Jark. I present the case of the Salty sandbox and the In-game Jobs. I DM'd my first game after years of playing D&D, and got a crew of friends and told them all I wanted to run a Sandbox-y game, with multiple possible quest lines that they could choose to engage with or not. The first session went well, and the second started them all in the town they met in, as they hadn't left yet, with clues to 2 possible quests. They decided to go check the last spot in town, the factory, for clues, and rolled middling investigation roles resulting in some not-so-significant info. They decided to stick around, despite my mention they had gotten "most of the info", and asked to apply for jobs at the town factory as a means of prying more. I fully ran job interviews for each of them, individually, then roleplayed them working their jobs while talking to more NPC's. This took almost 3 hours in session, followed by an energetic (mostly good natured) argument when I revealed they didn't gain anything, other than gold, by getting jobs - and I figured they wanted to do it for fun. They moved on the following session and the rest of the game was well received, but they still razz me for "letting them waste time working jobs" to this day, to which I counter I told them it was a sandbox at the start... Was I at fault for not pushing my players to leave out-of-character? Or are they unjustified in razz-ing me since their choices in the sandbox led to their ~3 hour workplace roleplay?

Eriks Svarcbergs

Hello, esteemed members of the court. I wish to bring to the you my most obscene use of rules lawyering. Early into a campaign, a member of our party was be headed. We did not have access to revivify, however an npc we were traveling with did. Our dm stated that revivify does not replace any MISSING limbs. I then argued that the head was not missing." I have it right here." I replied, and simply placed it back on the neck before having the spell cast. My dm, loves stretching the word of spells. With the rest of the group backing me up that the spell says missing not removed, we argued that we should be able to revivify the PC. He allowed it, and seemed impressed, also annoyed. Would you allow this fun interpretation, considering the players all got a kick out of it, or would you leave the PC dead? Thank you for your time.

A Gross Infection

To the esteemed judge Axford, and friends. We've been playing 5e with some friends for awhile and now my partner has volunteered to run a PF2e one-shot to add some flavor to our games. Most of this group has only played 5e and are nervous at trying a new system. We are also new to 2e, so how do I support her as a player and how can we represent 2e in all of its glory? We're using your podcast, and ones you mentioned, as a voluntary pre-introduction. And to Jake's point, we will still honor Dice Christ and their holy Nat 20 in our games. Praise be!

Jon Smith