Former D&D Lead says Bonus Actions suck. I have opinions.

I mean, in my opinion, the entire action economy of DnD is trash. I've never seen a game wanting so DESPERATELY to be a tactics-heavy tabletop game played on battle maps with grids, yet refusing to be that and trying to be a narrative role playing experience.

It tries to do both and fails spectacularly at both. Want tactics and deep strategy, custom builds and combat? Play the Pathfinders.
Want a system that enhances your narrative, gives you the freedom to really express what happens through narration, not hard numbers? FATE.

Like...why does DnD exist? It's...just bad at both. I will freely admit that I do not understand the appeal of DnD over other systems. It feels like the ultimate fast food blandness. It does nothing but provide the minimum of sustenance and a tiny bit of flavor. It's the McDonald's of RPG systems.

Can someone, who genuinely loves DnD (AND have played several other systems) explain to me what is so good about DnD? Because I didn't grow up in the US and wasn't exposed to DnD until I was in my mid 30's, and by then my reaction was "this is garbage" compared to almost every other system I had tried in my 30 years of existence. Please help. Why?

Imho there´s just not enough stuff for bonus actions, but generally I welcome them :)

Comments for the Algorithm! All hail Deathbringer and Professor DM!

I think saying that short rests, death saves, and revivify exist for babies who are too scared of their character dying is way too judgemental when we're talking about a game everyone plays in their own way. A lot of people want their campaign to be a heroic storytelling experience, not a war-gamey goblin-slasher where you make a new PC once every three sessions.

Imagine if in Lord of The Rings Frodo died half-way through the first book, and The Fellowship immediately ran into another hobbit whom they accepted immediately. And that new hobbit makes it all the way to the end of Two Towers, but dies in the end, along with Gimli and Sam (Merry bit the dust near the beginning of the second book). And in the end of the third book the only original member of the party is Gandalf, with everyone else being strays he picked up along the way instead of the older fallen members. I feel like that type of storytelling would make all character progression near non-existent, characters themselves impossible to get invested into, and the story itself very difficult to follow.


Wanting character death to be more preventable or reversible is just a player preference (a very common one), not a failure of the players to get gud.

"It takes ten minutes to get back to my turn each round"

Ok, there's two main issues at play here:

Issue one, other players are taking too long with their turns. There's a couple reasons people might be taking too long with their turns. They might be unfamiliar with what their character can do - this especially applies to spellcasters not knowing what their spells do. In this case they should be looking into that BEFORE the session. Session prep isn't exclusive to the DM (who, by the way, should also be familiarizing themselves with what the enemies do). The other reason players might be taking a long time with their turns is just that they haven't been paying attention to the combat outside of when it affects their character, so when it gets to their turn again they have to reassess the whole board state. Remind your players that they shouldn't be passively just letting combat happen outside their turn, they should be constantly watching what happens and plotting their next move, talking strategy with the other players ("I've got this minotaur zombie under control, you guys deal with the goblin skeletons"), keeping an eye on the enemy strategy ("Gee that red dragon really has it out for our draconic bloodline sorcerer..."), and other things like that.

The other big issue here is a lack of patience and respect for other players. This is already much less of an issue if players are keeping engaged with combat outside their turns, as mentioned in my previous point. Waiting longer to take your turn hurts a lot less when you're still invested in what's going on outside your turn, and completely ignoring what other players are doing on theirs is blatantly disrespectful. And there is an aspect as well of things taking longer simply because it's a bigger group. A party of 3 players is going through combat more quickly than a party of 6 players, not only just because there's fewer players doing things but also because they generally don't have to face as many enemies. That's just a trade-off you agree to when you play in a larger group.

Bonus actions aren't the real reason combat is taking forever. Players with poor table etiquette are. The sooner you start teaching your players to practice good table etiquette (and enforcing it!), the sooner you'll start running faster combats.

I get where you're coming from and whether I agree or disagree with you isn't really relevant, I'm not going to take advice from Mike "women and minorities are too dumb to understand lore" Mearls.

You should probably try playing a system where it doesn't take 500 hours to resolve a turn

Complexity is a Devils Bargain where you trade off between the fun and intricacies of character creation and the fun and engagement within a game session.

Engagement coment

I run D&D 5e for the majority of my games, but I definitely hack it with impunity to add certain fun factors (story cards; special critical hit effects, etc.) or speed up play (highest initiative goes first then clockwise afterwards; default Room DC for ALL DCs in a room [AC, skill checks, saves, etc.]). My players were a little weary initially, but they really enjoyed the hacks once they saw how quickly play picked up. I always make sure players have buy-in before any house rules/hacks are officially adopted, but I'm lucky to have a group willing to try most any adjustments if it'll make things fun. My games regularly have 5+ players, so anything to expedite play is typically appreciated.

I am always learning new things from this channel. Thank you Professor! That "we all take our turn at the same time" totally makes sense the way you put it, even through a stuffy nose

It sounds like you just want to play a video game man

i think bonus actions are a really ellegant solution to ingame actions that are secondary to whatever a player was already going to do with their main action like: attacking with a off-hand weapon. 5e's problem was stacking too many stuff into it, like spells with bonus action as a casting time or rogue abilities letting them do main action things as bonus actions. it like they were thinking "hey, this works great, let's use this as much as we can"


bonus actions itself was great design, the design around them was the problem.

Legendary actions suck, nothing like waiting 15 minutes for a turn just to have an “I’m sorry that doesn’t work, there goes your turn and your spell slot.” Have a nice day, please play again.

comment. this is just for engagement.Since it seems my views don't matter anymore.

Question: on the "no bonus action game", how do you deal with the classes that are balanced around having a constant bonus aciton? like monks who would lose several attacks with flurry? I'd have to assume it'd be very assymetrical and feel bad for those players? do you declare attack, and then explain how many attacks you actually get for an example?

I think Bonus Action, as an idea, are great. The implementation leaves a bit to be desired, though. I tend to use 2 ways to speed up encounters. Firstly, I use a turn clock. You have 60 seconds to decide what you are going to do with your turn, otherwise your PC simply attacks with the agreed upon method. In session zero, my players choose this method, most casters pick a cantrip, martials have get to set parameters for ranged vs melee attack, and gish characters get can choose a weapon attack or a cantrip, based on their class. This creates a sense of urgency in combat and speeds it up. The second method I use is that initiative order is determined by dexterity modifier, ties are settled with dexterity scores and finally with the roll of a d4, highest roll wins. Since I have a list of all of the dexterity scores of my PCs, its never a question of what order they go in, just where the creatures they encounter fall within that list. You never have to guess when your next turn is, it never really changes unless your dexterity does, and it ensures initiative flows smoothly. I, also, made it so activating a "state of being" class feature, like Innate Sorcerery, Barbarian Rage, or Bladesong, happens when you roll initiative and lasts until the end of combat, and all spells with a 1 minute duration simply last until the end of combat or you stop concentrating on them. I, also, have a house rule allowing anyone to make 1 weapon attack as a bonus action so long as they are proficient with the weapon they are wielding. This way everyone always has access to some sort of bonus action, granted it makes Dual Wielder, Polearm Master, and a small part of Great Weapon Master redundant, so the first 2 rarely see play at my table. I, personally, am a big time optimizer when I play, but none of the players I DM for are, so most of them choose flavor over function 10/10 times.

Honestly sounds like your players need to think about their turns during the other player's turns. Parrallel processing is much faster even if you sometimes need to revise your plans because of someone else. If need be you can use an hourglass to force them to make decisions quickly.

I like bonus actions because deciding A and B gives you as a player way more freedom than just A. What your describing is faster but often dull since you have so much less agency.

I have never played a campaign that less than 7 sessions unless it was a one shot or long sessions. I mean like 8 or more hours per. Even then they were extremely rare.

I dunno why ppl feel the need to speed up gameplay, like if the only valid part of TTRPGs are the storytelling and the moment to moment gameplay be dammed, I also dunno why ppl act like power gaming is not a valid way to play the game and I also fail to see how the 10 year olds saying the silver tongued bard should be the one trying to convince someone instead of a less articulated person is bad in anyway shape or form.

At our table, if initiative is even needed (sometimes you know who goes first based on the story and situation), initiative is rolled as d20 + ability modifier and then we progress clockwise starting at the highest roll... and the bad guys / gm occupy the 6 o'clock slot (unless there are many of them then they occupy the 6 and 12 o'clock slot) at the table. So typically some players take their turns, then the gm, then the rest of the players. 1 move and 1 action per turn, getting an extra action per turn is only via a special ability / power (ie. a second attack due to your magic sword).

When it is a players turn I turn to them and say "ok it is your turn, what do you do, 5.. 4.. 3.. 2.. 1.." and if they do not have an answer by the time I count down from 5 then their character takes no action this turn as they are caught in indecisiveness. The wolves attacking them will not wait for them to decide what to do... After this happened a few times the players really start to make sure they are thinking about what they want to do before it gets to their turn...

I like the idea of everyone declare what your are going to do and then everyone roll at the same time... I will work that in at some point and maybe combine it with the above method. as a group "everyone think of and tell me what action your character is going to take 5.. 4.. 3.. 2.. 1.."

Great video as always !

i like your idea of everyone rolling their combat turn at once.

DMs don't need to know the rules but needs to know what rule to use. Hummmm oxymoron

Hey! Love the Sweater. Sorry you were under the weather.

Sometimes an idea seems cool. Then it grows into something new, different from the beginning.

If I mastered a campaign and my players signed off at 7. lvl I would be very depressed. I am over 60 years old and the average age of my players is around 35. That is why I still play 3.5e. The game seems to die around lvl 15 to 17. That usually takes 3 to 5 years. I am not a fan of 5.e!

I absolutely love your style man, found your channel when I was looking for ideas in running a game with kids. I like that you put emphasis on speed and well, just bloody getting on with it and not getting bogged down in long boring stuff

Always enjoy the content. Thanks.

The rules are there for guidelines and if they get in the way of fun you should ignore them.

Every player or DM that I haven't loved playing with has always talked about the importance of balance. "We need to do it this way because of balance." I've come to realize that balance isn't nearly as important as people think when it comes to a good TTRPG game. If you want balance you should play 4E because all characters were essentially the same with different skins. A good story depends on there being imbalance amongst the party or antagonists.

Princess Leia (in the OT) wasn't a Jedi, an amazing pilot, or even the best fighter but she was a huge part of the group in all the movies and always contributed. I think in the pursuit of balance we bog down the game and keep things from being fun... This has been my ramble. Feel free to move on.

As a teenager, I modded my AD&D2 so much that I played 3e before it came out. Now, I modded DnD 5e so much that I play the 6e...of World of Darkness.

Ginni D/Deathbringer crossover when?

Try yakisoba noodles. They're decent.

Oh there's a patreon link, two, they both have to be yours right, right.

"You're not playing vanilla/RAW D&D 5e" I feel like that statement is factually accurate. Personally I don't know if anyone should play vanilla/RAW D&D 5e as I don't think vanilla/RAW 5e is a good system.

Now playing RAW/RAI Pathfinder 2e, I think people should do it, at least when they're learning the system as I think the system has math that is a lot tighter, and that modifying stuff, like, god forbid, removing the multiple attack penalty. Doing that without knowing why it exists will likely break the system as PF2e is a finely tuned machine that purrs just right. Now if you know the system, by all mean use official variant rules, or just straight up homebrew rules to your hearts content.

Also just to elaborate about PF2e, you could ignore some stuff as long as you don't change or modify the core rules of combat, at least not in a way that affects +bonus to hit.

It's just become D&D: the Rules Lawyering & bogs the game down so badly that after the 1st hour, most of the players get bored or frustrated & just want to do cool shit with their characters & many new players won't show up after the second session.
At this point, all we do is play VTM 1-3e as it's more narrative-based but still provides structure for combat & resolves that pretty easily - unless someone has a lot of celerity actions. Elder games, however, take about as frustratingly long as many D&D combats when you have a lot of merits/flaws & disciplines to juggle or scenes to prep for combat (if there is any, as many games often go without any combat resolutions).

Mike Mearls said Bonus actions were a mistake all the way back in I think it was 2018. Then he explained in one of the Happy Fun Hour streams that it was used to give some classes abilities that they could use while still using other actions, but probably should have just make them class features.

Aphantasia is not a disadvantage for playing D&D or DMing. I have it and I went though at least 40 years of my life before learning it was a thing and people literally saw imagery in their head.

I wish I could get my players to take turns like that, but that only happens when I get a kids table at a convention. Log gone are the days of my old school gamer players where they would do something crazy and know how a character sheet works and think ahead of time. 99% of players now use DnD Beyond and see their sorcerer has Actions in Combat: Two-Weapon Fighting and insist they should be in melee.

You know what's not looking good? I ordered a Deathbringer mini a month and a half ago, and still no mini. Customer service won't even cancel the order and refund my money. Don't order from Only Games, Co Do not order from ONLY GAMES!!!!!

I like Swift Actions better.
1. There would be a list of basic Swift Actions (like chugging a potion) that everyone has access to.
2. You could always spend a Standard or Move Action to execute a Swift Action.
3. If you use a Reaction, you eat up the Swift Action you’d have had on your next turn.

I think that Bonus Actions aren’t terrible on the face of them, they just really make things lopsided when my character doesn’t have any, but the next character can fire off a Bonus Action healing spell, a movement, and an attack. I just like limiting Reactions and Bonus Actions by lumping them together. Makes things faster.

At the end of the day, I prefer DC20 RPG’s method of having X number of actions, with which you can attack, move, cast a spell, use an ability, or use a Reaction (off-turn) per round.

Bonus action: suck a fat one

How many furries on Reddit does it take to completely destroy you? You sound like a pathetic idiot complaining that we upgraded computers from punch cards to microprocessors. Ignorant pos

I feel like the focus on low level play has been evident since the debut of 5e. Look at the Monsters by CR chart in the DMG (2014, of course). The focus is on a variety of low level foes with very little in the tier 3 and 4 range, with some CRs entirely absent from the MM.

I'm stealing Cheesecake Factory Menu of Options. 😂

Thanks so much for this!

Nothing wrong with the bonus actions, it's your players.

If everyone goes at the same time then you don't need the initiative roll.

This video is awesome!