Wizards of the Coast launches official Dungeons & Dragons Actual Play show

Doc_Klueless · 2026-04-19T21:26:28+0100

bedir than said:
98G here! Hello.

Woot! I was a 98G1LRU once upon a time. Like a really, really long time ago. Like back when The Wall was still standing.

Anyway... back to the action.

Mort · 2026-04-19T21:29:27+0100

nyvinter said:
Considering that some new player characters don't get introduced for weeks or guest players don't show up at all because the player's went to a different empire, scripted is highly unlikely. And that's before one take no leaks into consideration or the awful pacing or learning four hours of script every week is not something I've heard anyone doing.

But also I kinda want to know what people think about playing the first Dragonlance modules then? Because those are more scripted than any AP I've seen/heard by parsecs.

The plot is laid out and the DM is given no room to deviate, but the players themselves have no idea what coming (unless they read the module) so from a gaming sense, it's a railroad but it's not scripted (because the players aren't in on it).

Reynard · 2026-04-19T21:38:15+0100

Mort said:
The plot is laid out and the DM is given no room to deviate, but the players themselves have no idea what coming (unless they read the module) so from a gaming sense, it's a railroad but it's not scripted (because the players aren't in on it).

This brings up the question: is a railroad a "script"?

Reynard · 2026-04-19T21:38:58+0100

Mournblade94 said:
I didn't look not did I care enough to look. I'm not combing the internet to find things like this. I didn't know that musicians contracts were left behind at any venue nor do I see how its vaguely a problem if someone found one. You know how much someone is being paid? Okeydoke. It seemed obvious to me and I'm not looking to take down some institution by proving the fraud of AP's or something. Lack of evidence is not evidence. And I know how secrets work, I was a cryptologist with the navy.

You are making an unsupported claim that does not fit any of the actual evidence. Ergo, the chances are pretty high that you are wrong.

AlViking · 2026-04-19T21:44:03+0100

bedir than said:
98G here! Hello.

So you know that the absence of evidence doesn't prove something -- like claiming that all APs are scripted without showing evidence.

How dare you say that lizardmen from Mars are not real just because there's no proof they exist!

bedir than said:
I am surprised that you have never heard the tales of musicians who demand M&Ms with no brown or only brown. Or Diet Pepsi at a Coke venue. Or the morning paper from that city. These are common tales that have been told and proven with evidence for decades.

The no brown M&Ms goes back to Van Halen and is actually true why-did-van-halen-demand-concert-venues-remove-brown-mms-from-the-menu. It's not that they care about the color of the M&Ms but the band had a lot of strict rules for how setup should be done and it was an easy thing to verify that the people setting up for the show followed instructions.

AlViking · 2026-04-19T21:45:05+0100

Mournblade94 said:
I didn't know that claim was even made. Honestly I would EXPECT them to say it wasn't scripted to maintain the audience. That doesn't seem far fetched to me. Sony lied about Toby MacGuire being in No Way Home. He turned up in the movie. I don't think Sony was immoral for it. Entertainment businesses lie all the time to keep things under wraps. I don't see the harm.

So you're calling professional actors liars with zero evidence.

AlViking · 2026-04-19T21:48:28+0100

Mort said:
The plot is laid out and the DM is given no room to deviate, but the players themselves have no idea what coming (unless they read the module) so from a gaming sense, it's a railroad but it's not scripted (because the players aren't in on it).

I would say that even a linear campaign (most published modules are linear or linear with different paths to the same events) is not scripted, a true railroad does dictate what the players choose do and, at least at a high level, say.

Mort · 2026-04-19T21:48:57+0100

Mournblade94 said:
As I said above it doesn't matter to me if it is scripted. If people think its fun that's the purpose of the thing.
Its my opinion from what I've seen that I wouldn't send a new player to an AP for information on how the game is played. I very well may be coming from a point of ignorance but I'm not going around blasting AP's in venues where it even matters. As it often happens this sight is pretty much the only place this sort of topic even comes up in my life so I talk about my feelings on the matter. A few of the people I game with are into it and they know I'm not so they don't talk about it with me. They do agree with me though they wouldn't send new players to learn a game there. Others are obviously going to disagree.

Again, actual plays aren't a monolith, some are pretty good for new players to get a sense of the game, and some wouldn't help at all.

Critical Role campaign 1 for example (IMO) is quite good for new players and especially for new DMs:

For new players, they get to see players adjusting to a new system and some learning the rules well and some just not caring. But the players show the rules pretty well, especially when some struggle.

For new DMs, campaign 1 is a really good primer on how to expand a world from just a single location and keep broadening from there. And how a DM can flesh out a world on the go. It's practically a step by step instruction manual.

mamba · 2026-04-19T21:57:10+0100

Mournblade94 said:
If you had Geeks and Sundry set up a critical role with Pretty actors for 4e, it would have become the standard. The 5e rules didn't make 5e massively popular, the shows about people playing Dungeons and Dragons did. But 2 variables are tough to isolate here. The professional actors of Critical Role making the game seem more acceptable, and the Covid Isolations.

by the time Covid hit, 5e was huge already, it got a boost, but it had eclipsed all prior editions before then.

5e benefited from the environment it came into, sure. 4e would have benefited too if it had been picked up like that, but I don’t think 4e could have pulled it off in the same way. The rules are not everything, but they are not irrelevant either

Whizbang Dustyboots · 2026-04-19T21:59:21+0100

AlViking said:
The no brown M&Ms goes back to Van Halen and is actually true why-did-van-halen-demand-concert-venues-remove-brown-mms-from-the-menu. It's not that they care about the color of the M&Ms but the band had a lot of strict rules for how setup should be done and it was an easy thing to verify that the people setting up for the show followed instructions.

Yeah, I heard a recent version on a podcast, where one artist was asking for a melon to be cubed and left in their green room. She doesn't even like melons, but it was just a check to see if they had read and were adhering to the contract.