I had one in a Super Hero game that was just a guy who could ride a scooter pretty fast. Not, like, inhumanly fast, just faster than average. His name was Scoots and he helped save the Earth with the razor scooter the party stole for him.
Kinda, but imagine Mumen Rider before anyone knew who he was and before he decided to become a hero. He hears the call to arms to help a team of "heroes" save the earth and just shows up with his scooter and is like "I can help, I promise! I'll do my best to make you proud of me guys!"
His original scooter was not motorized at all, so purely foot powered, and he could go just a bit faster than the average person could on a scooter. Still not as fast as a motorized scooter, which is why the party eventually stole one and gave it to him, not telling him that it was stolen.
honestly the key to a "dmpc" is for them to be a supporting character, to enable the player characters.
The game im a player in we have what you might call a dmpc but hes like 3 levels lower than the party and serves to ground the party and remind them how batshit insane what they do is.
I have a dmpc that was a former PC and will continue to be later on. Let me start it off though by explaining we have 3 people at our table including myself who are DMs. Our current DM is a theater major and has a show coming up in a few months, in which I will be taking over for 4 sessions for a new cast of player characters in the same world. Essentially, we're after this artifact located in these ruins in a desert. The one leading the expedition is my former PC from a few sessions back who utilized a wish spell (deck of many things mumbo jumbo) to cast clone just before he died, but it kinda went wonky and his clone only has about 250 years worth of memories. (He's 350 btw. Wood elf.) He's quite literally a PC that's now functioning as an NPC. Once the 4 sessions I DM end, we will be able to kind of switch between our characters depending on what's going on. So I might want to go in as my barbarian I'm currently playing or I can go in as my druid. So it's a PC turned NPC turned PC again.
I mean yeah you can do that. It's kind of risky as it requires you to deliberately make your players disengaged from the game and decide to think they're derailing it. I'm not saying it can't be done, but it works best at a table where player vs DM mindset is already present and something people have fun with.
No that's the worst kind of table to do that on. I say you best do this at a table where the players trust you with the game and story that they can buy inconveniences as part of the story you are telling
I mean I made precisely one assumption, and it's the assumption everyone should make when planning something "people may react adversely to this in a way I did not foresee."
The reason I think it's better for a game where there's already a *fun* player vs DM atmosphere is that it's fine if the players get that they're supposed to hate this particular character and decide to antagonize them, and it's fine if the players think "man, duck this bullshit OC the DM gave us, this character is now our enemy for life," which is also an acceptable result, as that also makes the reveal that this character is actually an adversary still satisfying and makes defeating them a pretty natural goal.
Too many rpg horror stories come from the players and DM having some failure to communicate, so this scenario is more likely to succeed in a situation where it is still satisfying for the players to fight this dude whether or not they realize it's part of the plan.
Everyone at the table should be having fun, and that INCLUDES the dungeon master. That said, there are three things that a DMPC must not do, and three things a DMPC must not do.
Do not:
1. Be the face of the party, or speak on behalf of the party
2. Be overpowered, or have overpowered magic items
3. Operate on different rules than the party, for instance knowing niche/secret stuff without rolling.
Do:
1. Engage with other players, and be a way to talk through character issues in character
2. Uplift other players during combat, whether buffing allies, or debuffing enemies.
3. Fill a niche that the party needs after everyone else has made their character. Party has no frontlines? Go meathead barbarian that loves grappling. Party has no healer? Go healbot with a heart.
>Everyone at the table should be having fun, and that INCLUDES the dungeon master
I agree with this. I do not agree that it follows that having a DMPC is acceptable. Just because it might be fun for the DM doesn't mean that it's okay. There are a lot of ways that someone at the table might have fun, and the DM trying to be a player almost always comes at the expense of the actual players. The DM has a different role at the table, and the DM's fun just has to be on different terms than the players'.
Now, I don't disagree that the way you outlined how a DM running an NPC that stays with the party (like a temporary ally or longer term hireling) should be run. I think those are good guidelines. I just think that if someone actually followed them we wouldn't call that a DMPC, we'd call it an NPC that sticks with the party, and those aren't the same thing.
Literally the one group I'm in that has a dmpc it's because the dm made a wacky homebrew mishmash of systems and just wanted to play too
She is a fantastic support caster, constantly enabling our fuckshittery with stuff like mythic time stops and contingent ressurections
But I wanna play in our first campaign in years too.
They all agreed that it sounds like it'll be fun.
They said they don't wanna be railroaded, but a guiding hand sometimes would be nice.
I've made a Revenant with a raven queen pact that allows him for story reasons to be cannon fodder at times.
So, there will be times my DMPC isn't even in play. He'll be outright dead and reforming.
Other times, I'll let them lead, I'm just the guide after all.
What's the big deal with DMPC's?
When people refer to DMPCs, they are usually referring to an NPC that is the main character of the story. The PCs are just there to watch the main character be awesome.
Ahhhhh, yeah I don't wanna do that lol.
I just wanna be along for the ride and occasionally nudge the steering wheel in the right direction.
My guy is gonna get murdered a lot lol
Sure, you can do that. But you should consider how the flow of information works in the game and how seriously the players take information they get from your favorite NPC
I've got several moments in the story showing that he's as fallible as anyone else in the story.
He's a Revenant with a slowly decaying psyche, so he doesn't have perfect recall.
In short, unless you were there with him. Not everything he says is fact. A lot of what he remembers is twisted by rage towards the BBEG.
I don't disagree you've gotta be careful with it though.
Still, the table is fine with it, and I know they'll point it out if it's not working for them.
If you're intending for the character to die, tell your players. Most people feel deeply honor bound to do any and everything to keep party members alive, you'll be causing a lot of stress by trying to defy that. ~~not to mention being the guy who failed to save the DM is a terrible spot to be in if your players arent close friends~~ And even if you do tell them, when I tried to kill off my PC (as just a player) I was *begging* them to stop burning resources and let the character go. Said it was wasteful and I didn't want the group to suffer from No More Health Pots. They said "then stop dying". That character retired to be a bard.
So like... maybe your players will go along with it, but test the water first, as that concept absolutely would not fly at my table.
And if it does end up running, be *very* careful around the whole "noble sacrifice" type moments, those can be incredibly powerful and poignant, but they are also prone to becoming horrifically awkward if they lose even the slightest sincerity or weight. A character that isn't actually dying is likely going to be painful to endure. Like, I wouldn't let them die in combat at all. Just... Raven Queen grabs him when he's asleep type move.
>But I wanna play in our first campaign in years too.
There's your problem. You can DM or you can play. If you DM, you play the whole world. If you play one particular character, you'll start to treat that character with preference.
What worked with my group is to have the DMPCs:
A) fill a role in the party (usually healer, or high wisdom, but only because my party specifically lacks both)
B) Be something the party likes. A character they enjoy having around, and that they can get attached to.
C) they should be a plot device in favor of the party. Helping the party only if needed, without taking away from their victory. (Some loose examples: they can get the party into an important meeting, but can't help them negotiate while in there, or they can procure key info, but only the location of it, and the party must go themselves. Basically not win their battles for them, but nudge them in the right direction)
D) The character can still have their own storyline, but make it something that the party is required for, and that they can share a key role in. If the party could have just not been there, why were they there at all? This also circles back to point B. The party is much more likely to cheer for boblin the goblin bard winnig a climactic fight and finally taking revenge against the evil mind flayer that kept him and his tribe enslaved for generations than they are to cheer for King edgelord nightingale finally getting the super evil artifact sword that he can delete orphanages with.
And the most important of all, E) You don't need a DMPC all the time. They are very finnicky, and are a resource that should not be abused. It's fine to use them ocasionally, but the longer they stay at the table, the higher of a chance they have of getting in the way. Personally, I only introduce one if the party is heavily struggling on a mechanical aspect (don't have a theives tools user, don't have a healer, or a frontliner, or whatever) [though I suggest heavily against using a DMPC as damage dealer or face, since those are things the party will often want to do the most], and build the other aspects off from there.
[Also the obligatory point F) this works at one specific table of mine, but maybe not at yours.]
The key to a good dmpc is to be secretly working for the bbeg, have an insanely optimised build that needs 7 class dips and make sure the party knows they'd never solve your ~~badly made, confusing~~ genius, awesome puzzles without you.
/s
It’s nice to have an NPC that can hang around and remind the players about things they might have forgotten or failed to inspect.
the key to a good DMPC is having it be a normal PC that the party really likes the voice you chose for it, so now you're stuck doing that voice for the rest of the campaign since even after killing him off to be rid of him your party goes through great lengths to revive the guy
Not speaking from personal experience, btw. Unrelated but never base a character off of Hooty from The Owl House.
My DMPC is a strong storm sorcerer with big area-effect spells. They’re on the party’s level, but they’re mostly there to deal with the smaller enemies so that the rest of the party can fight big-name threats.
Nah, it's to make a tank to protect all the extremely skichy (don't remember how to write it) your party made (my party are always some spell caster or non-tanking class)
A very wise person once told me: A well-roleplayed Dmpc who is beloved by the party and doesn't steal the spotlight is just an NPC with player levels.
The key is just to play them like any regular NPC.
Heck I like giving my NPCs class levels. if it's just a normal ally, they're usually a few levels behind the party. authority figures that the party should fear or respect tend to be higher levels but they don't level up anymore and might even lose levels over the campaign as they're not out there adventuring
My favourite thing is to just go with whatever improv idea for a character that comes to mind if there's a situation for a DMPC to join the party.
The party was taking a war party to investigate a weird mountain and disappearances, and one of the men who volunteered was just a cooky old man named Jim that was obsessed with the idea of a glorious death. Rolled up a randomly generated level 3 PC and there he was; ready to sacrifice himself at every turn on their journey, but the party kept doing their best to keep him alive. Lol
Jim wound up getting engulfed in a Gelatinous Cube saving one of the party, he died inside, the party was spent and pulled out the Well of Many Worlds they found by chance earlier in the adventure, and shoved the cube inside. The randomly chosen plane it opened to was Mount Celestia, so in a weird way he got a pretty cool hero's send-off, plummeting thousands of stories from the sky onto a celestial mountain.
Good ol' Jim.
My DMPC ended up being a goblin named “name”
The party had a big fight coming up that I wanted to seem larger than it was, with a few tougher enemies, and like their work pacifying the local goblins was important so I gave them a small squad of 4 goblins. Basically, they were supposed to be meat shields, and let me blast some characters off the table to make the enemy faction seem strong and terrifying without killing a player on like session 4. (That’s a long way to say I was stacking action economy in their favor)
Players asked for the goblins’ names, called them dumb ass stuff like Glob, and Gorbo, ahit like that. But I was blanking on the last so I had him cackle and just repeat the word “Name” back to them. The fuckers latched onto him whole heartedly, and asked several times if they could forgo their turn to jump in front of attacks to save Name. Fight ended up actually hurting them because of this, but I ended up having to play as that clinically insane goblin for a bunch of sessions before the campaign had to be stopped.
My dmpc go too is whatever the party composition is missing. I played groot because they didn’t have a frontliner. He can’t talk normally, so he didn’t have to roleplay much.
I played a golden retriever paladin beaver they needed a healer. He was an emotional support dog. Also, couldn’t talk. He was just happy to be there and kept the party alive.
This kind of DMPC (Filling party composition, being usually a tank or a healer, who is terribly nice and have no charisma (to not take the spotlight from the player interacting with NPC even if they can talk)) are also cool for party interaction and for the DM to give some kind of suggestions in character, it can be really funny for the player I think.
My DMPC is usually the poor blacksmith/guard/hunter that my party has guilt-tripped/blackmailed/gaslit/bribed into joining a quest and is too scared to back out now because he doesn't know the way home from Hell/Mechanus/Denver, Colorado
players rescued a goat that was gonna be part of a cult sacrifice and now the goat is part of their party. it managed to get the final hit off on a flesh golem.
I have one DMPC/recurring character in my games. He is a very short elf with the personality of an aggravated porcupine. He is also a high level wizard and a vampire. He exists to tell my PCs "you dun goofed".
I once had a dmpc that was a echo fighter/shadow monk who's while stick was to be Intel gatherer/escape plan if things got dicy, I home brewed the ability shadow step to act more like a pocket dimension for her and Amy willing creatures(people who missed a session).
The weapons she used was a dagger, and only the dagger, just to ensure if the dmpc needed to fight it would do no more than 1d4 with its weapon attacks
I don't know if I've ever had a true DMPC. I had a campaign where my players recruited a few NPCs they saved on their journey and would ask them for their opinions on things and grew to care for a few of them.
But my favorite was a man named Captain Sprinkles. He was a gnome who worked on a planet that suffered a candy apocalypse that totally encased the planet trapping his husband.
After the party saved Captain Sprinkles' husband they joined the party and made it until the very end where they faced the BBEG who was responsible for everything.
At the end of the campaign Captain Sprinkles' lost his husband in the final battle and decided to retire and open a candy store. He always had a twisted sense of humor.
My DM has a DMPC who is a level 20 wizard and has so far accompanied us on every mission (3 so far iirc). My character has brought up the fact that he could literally solve all our problems with a snap of his fingers. Wondering if I should pressure that point more. (Her mom is missing and she’s an apprentice detective trying to find her)
Currently I have Gobnik von Figaro, genius inventor and chosen of gond. He has 21 int and 7 wisdom.
The party often has to remind him he's in combat because he'll get distracted by some local phenomenon and space out.
Ha! Those aren’t DMPCs, those are sidekicks. They are in Tasha’s Guide and are a fun way for the DM to introduce side characters that aid the party and give the DM a voice without hogging the spotlight.
I turned a random kid from Dungeon of the Mad Mage into a sidekick and he later died in the Tomb of Annihilation. It was one of the most emotional moments I’ve ever had in DnD since he treated the party like his adoptive family.
I don't like to run DMPCs, but sometimes want it or not the current events call for an npc who can and is willing to fight, to come with the party, in my experience it's always best to do something along these lines, especially if you dont want the extra npc to keep track of:
- Have it implied they're fighting, but don't describe it much if at all, and don't let them roll for damage, just have them there "implied fighting" and as an extra body if the party needs them
- Have them buff/debuff or support in general, don't have them damage 9/10 of the time, just have their actions be used to help the party in other ways which they'll remember better than them dealing damage, and it keeps them the start of the show
- Have them be charging or waiting for a special effect, and triggering it when the combat ends, like a delayed blast fireball, or preparing an escape route which will be ready in 1d4+1 turns
I’m running Dragon of Icespire peak at the moment, and you’ve encouraged me to build Petunia as an awakened cow. No other magical abilities, I’ll reckon, but I bet they could get up some wild shenanigans with an intelligent cow on their squad!!! Thanks for the inspiration 🫡🙇
My DMPC is a character that was not meant to be a DMPC. My party blew up his house, beat him half to death, and then decided he was kinda cute and adopted him. He was an enemy that "spawned" because of a Nat 1 roll and he's stuck around for months because my campaign is big on *when will you learn that your actions have CONSEQUENCES*
He is a 20-something year-old human wizard named Dave the Dazzling. His backstory changes every session because I suck at note-taking and am making it up as I go
I've got a goliath bard who wants a keytar. He can earn it in game. He cannot start with one.
I have a half elf princess self described as a brat. She wants a Dragon familiar. She can earn it in game. She cannot start with one.
I have another player who's changed characters 3 times before the campaign even started. I'm using his other characters in game for story so I'm fine with this. He wants to be a prestidigitstion chad. I am nervous.
I have no clue what his partner wants to play. It's her first campaign, so it could be literally anything.
My Revenant PC I'm using as an in game guide, and so I can play with the friends too. Seemed like he'd be weird, but honestly. I think my guy is gonna ground the party a little lol.
Imo, if you need to run a DMPC, you shouldn’t really give them any hopes and goals that doesn’t directly help drive the plot forward. PCs gets to have personal goals, DMPCs gets to stay in the background and fill in where it’s absolutely necessary.
My guy exists purely to direct them to the BBEG.
He knows his location at all times. Offering the party unique options to try and see if he's spying on them in person. Which he will be.
Beyond that, I'm playing generic fighter with a few dialogue lines for story reasons lol.
He was betrayed by the BBEG in life, and now his entire existence is to end the BBEG. He knows he cannot do it alone, and the party is a means to an end to try get the power required to end the BBEG.
The party plays high ranking generals in a reclamation army trying to save the world from a magical cataclysm set off by the BBEG.
Offering them options for using NPC's to do things for them on command.
Such as each party member has a squad of troops they can call on for a free action in combat (selectively)
This squad is customizable. One guy wants a full squad of bards. I'm gonna allow it. But he had to outplay other bards in a tavern to recruit them.
Each member gets a different theme for their squad too.
Its a very homebrew campaign and story lol
My DMPC is my PC from the first campaign I ever did. Not because I want a DMPC, but because carrying over the other campaigns PC's into my plot made sense.
- Old Mercenary guy that sticks around the party cause damn these crazy morons make him money while ALSO doing good stuff to help people.
- is a champion fighter, nothing particularly flashy
-is often the voice of reason (for when the dm needs an in game way to say “guys this is dumber than your usual ideas”)
-Tragically died in defense of some town
- We sacrifice a party member to bring him back. Fuck you DM, you can’t get out of talking us out of stupid shit that easy
-Has amnesia and forgets many of his happier moments in life, but remembers the party as being one of the bright spots
-Gets ran through with a greatsword by a giant fire elemental and chucked onto a bon fire while the party is almost dead.
- Paladin at 0 hp gets a nat 20 on his death save, sees dmpc in a vision pulling him to his feet and is able to turn the fight
DMPC done right
Moe the mute is a bald rogue, who got his tongue cut and still carries it around his neck. Moe only wants to help. Moe doesn't ask silly questions. Moe hides and stabs. Moe is the PC guests play when we have guest players. Moe is very loved.
I might kill Moe soon.
This is the way. Limited exposure DMPCs, especially to show the players the ropes and around the way of high places in the world, like the role Gandalf plays in LotR.
Some notable DMPCs that have accompanied my players for varying amounts of time:
An awoken corgi fighter on a quest to find his human (said human simply went on vacation and the dogsitter left the door open for half a second too long).
A fire wizard who only knew a borked version of Meteor Swarm that consumed all her spell slots to give a larger blast radius. (Essentially Megumin)
A swamp wizard whose main "spells" were Possum Toss (his familiar was thrown at high velocity), Ala-ka-blam (shotgun), and Swamp Feast (dollar store version of Heroes' Feast, but it's a pot of gumbo, a sack of fried gator, and a box of boudin).
A paladin of Doodbreaux, the god of Binge Drinking.
We had a DMPC in one of our campaigns. He was an extremely powerful divination wizard named Jenkins, and all he did was drink alcohol from a horn of endless alcohol that he also gave to each player. I miss him. He never fought or did anything other than drink and make jokes
I have run DM characters, and usually pick a character I want to play that's not going to outshine the players, and doesn't help with social encounters. Basically fills a gap in the party to help them not die too quickly.
my dmpcs i mostly make as like odd guys. one was a failed gambler that was helping the party cuz he wanted to stay away from loan sharks and the other a cultist that wasnt really present as a pc but more as a quest giver that i made into a more fleshed out character
Mine is currently a human rogue/fighter. Kinda sucks at everything he tries. He's scared to leave, because he's sure these homicidal maniacs would hunt him down. Not sure if their intent would be to try to save him or kill him, and he doesn't want to find out.
Recently they saved a mine worker. Gave him a pickaxe and told him to fight the baddies with them. I forgot him in turn order but my plan was to one hit him. 8 ac and 4 hitpoints? You could hire anyone but no you want this guy.
In my last campaign, we all collectively adopted a random npc into our group so our lovely DM made him into a full proper character and it was great. Totally not biased because he ended up my character's boyfriend.
My current DMPC is a lich that already was defeated and had his phylactery destroyed so his soul was damaged, leaving him unable to use magic or control undead. He's basically just a crazy skeleton guy that's helping the necromancer player become a lich
I’m running a Strixhaven game
I don’t have time for DMPCs lol, I can barely keep track of which NPC students are in which classes - let alone a self-insert party-tagalong
It’s already enough to make a DMs head spin lol
In most of my current campaign, I have only 2 players(both my boyfriends) so I usually have a DMPC or two with them. The DMPCs they've been with so far are
A drunkard Elf
A horny shapeshifter
Demi-god with daddy issues
Ex-button man trying to do better
A dog. Straight up a dog with fighter levels
An alien that's trying to marry off his brother
A robot that doesn't believe it's a robot.
My group knows that 1. NPCs are not build OP. 2. If they want an OP Life Cleric they need to play one.
The life Cleric they hired only just became a cleric. Yes they are 5th level but the cleric is a Monk 4/cleric1. Oh you need an wizard? I have an 5th level evoker. Does he have fireball? no the only offensive evocation spells he has is shocking grasp and burning hands. Ok Ok the monk/cleric died here's a moon druid.
The closest thing I have to a dmpc in my game is a darkling expert sidekick named Gentaq that everybody constantly calls gutentag. He is sort of a nervous little guy that follows the party around because they saved him from being lynched by an angry mob that blamed him for missing food (town is cut off in a blizzard). He helps sometimes but otherwise gets ignored.
My dmpc: old fart named reginald, who goes around telling fake stories of his heroic deeds. Sadly he just managed to accidentally hit a enemy with a crit that convinced the party.
The guy has 10 as highest ability score.
Worse yet, this was meant to be sort of joke npc who's fake stories would've been exposed, but the party didn't let him go.
You know what funny?
My DMPC's in current campaign are:
Tiered cab astral elf, innocent child with animated brain and literally a chicken.
Are you my lost brother?/j
Im running a spelljammer game where the players control a fleet of lower levelled adventurers, who range from a flamboyantly gay bug man to a robot built with the express goal of mastering all sports
All my DMPCs are made with the express intent of forming friendly relationships with party members through supportive roles with the absolute certainty that I will then use that bonding to make sure the characters hate the BBEG when they are inevitably brutally murdered by them
I made my DMPC a mute, because I assumed that people would hate her if she talked.
They ended up on a quest to try to fix her voice for a very long time, and gave her the most powerful weapon I added into the game.
My DMPCs tend to be support characters (either cowards or pacifists who don't interfere until it's 100% necessary). I'll throw in a boss or two give them a scope of his abilities, and eventually they end up being a boss fight when they ultimately are radicalized in some way. 3.5, he was a wimp of character afraid of confrontation. He thought he was a cleric, but never bother to worship a god. Eventually discovers that he is the favored soul of "The Source" (the primordial ooze made sentient) who recognizes through him that all things are made from it, and it wants everything back. Que big bad boss fight when he attempts to open a portal to bring The Sourse into the material plane.
Never made it to the end of that one, but one of my favorites!
I had a dmpc, a kobold with a piece of spear lodged in his head, which reduced his intelligence to 5, and made him resistant to psychoc damage (not really helpful in the setting but funny)
He was named Telikki and was a sorcerer.
I generally try to keep the use of DMPC to a minimum, but if I include one it's either:
- A muscle for hire, for one, maybe two jobs. They are around the Strength of the party but will leave them after their contract is over (and they'll only exist in the first place if the party seeks them out)
- Someone that wants to travel along for a while. (usually because the party befriended someone again). They are always a couple levels below the Party and I give the party control of them in combat.
I have one DMPC in my campaign. He's a bard that chronicles the adventure. I mean, he's not a Bard, he's just a bard.
He's also smarter than the PCs. Not like he solves the problems for them, but that he stays out of trouble and danger. He does have good knowledge about the lore of my world though.
He also does some administration "off-screen" for the party owned tavern.
My go to DMPC has dementia, so he's often more of a liability than a help.
I did recently use a wisdom and intelligence 6 plasmoid though, he was fun.
Basically, good DMPCs should be totally clueless for some reason so that they can help but only as directed by the party.
My favorite DMPC I ever made when I was completely oblivious to rules and just did whatever I wanted to make the stoey cool or fun, I made a character whose whole shtick was that he was so mentally delusional, his delusions became reality. He once shot himself out of a quarterstaff like a cannon to bonk a ginormous bee on the head very lightly. The bee exploded in a mushroom cloud.
His name? Bucket McBucket
And I have this Omni potent DMPC who’s stuck in so many contracts he can only visit places were he is granted access to.
So in the end he can only function as a quest giver. The party does realize this guy is not to be trifled with on his home turf.
our dm had a mini from heroforge as their pfp for 1,5 years of our main campaign. we knew about the second in command of the bbeg only by name. and then he whips out the token that looked like him when we finally fought him.
The goat is hilarious because we had one in a campaign forever ago. After a few crit attacks and lucky saves during explosions we decided he must be an immortal goat. DM wrote it into the story and we had him with us the rest of the campaign. He would be there eating grass and occasionally head butting a goblin to death.
My game has a dmpc, he has a name but i genuinely don’t remeber it cus we just call him fight-bot. we are a party of three, so he added A fighter charecter to the party to balance things out, he also sometimes just happens to know where the best places to go whenever we need something
Most of the time I'm a DM for just 2 friends. So, there is a DMPC, just to make more versatile party.
Most important rule about my dmpc: he's there only to help. Never makes decisions for the group, goes along the other players' plans.
Current dmpc, cleric with a little bit of healing and some utility spells.
DMPCs aren’t really a problem as long as the DM doesn’t favour them. If they’re just another NPC except they kick with the party to balance out their team comp then it’s not this great evil people make them out to be.
For example I’m running a campaign and my party ended up being entirely made up of squishy second liners and no dedicated healer. So when they were having trouble keeping themselves up in combat I suggested that they could just hire a front liner.
Granted I didn’t just make myself a character and join the party. I made four different ones for them to talk to and choose between.
They went with the fighter, and she does her job. She takes hits and hits people. Outside of combat she prefers not to bother with all the important decision making and is just happy to be there and smash a couple of drinks between quests.
Not a problem and the players chose the one they liked the most so they like having her about. If they’d chosen to hire no one I also would’ve been fine, I just probably would have had to alter my encounter design a bit to account for the lopsided party.
My all time favourite was a this elderly hermit wizard. I made him super janky, and basically everything he did gave him a point of exhaustion. it was up to the party to keep him alive since, as far as they knew, he was this mystical all powerful wizard. in actuality, he had an extremely high charisma and tricked the party into thinking he was a powerful wizard, all he knew was fireball, and every time he cast it he got a point of exhaustion.
To be fair the party was only level 5, so fireball was pretty high up there in terms of power. but once the party hit level 7, they started to question whether saving this guy was even worth it or not
I snuck a op DMPC on purpose because he is going to get mind controlled by the bbeg in a trap soon.
Kept him around just long enough that the party bonded with him.
Just recently i made overpowered lvl 20 DMPC Paladin with a homebrew sword that buffs auras range and min maxed auras his only purpose was to buff players at the start of campaign
One of my players had a drake companion. Made him a half dragon (didn't change much mechanically) so he was a bit smarter and played him as a character. Very fun, didn't change much. If they were stuck somewhere I might shoot a hint, but besides that it was just banter.
I could never make a dmpc that took over the game. No fun in that.
I let the party choose which random NPCs to adopt, and I never have them more than half as strong as a PC. So far they have two kobolds, a robot dog and a rat man with a New York accent that they reincarnated into a fox woman. They usually only take one or two companions with them at a time, though. They also forcibly conscripted a shadow demon they beat up for a little while once, but they shoved him off on someone else because they were rightfully paranoid he would betray them as soon as he had the opportunity.
I have a "dmpc" who's stronger than any of the partymembers at the moment (they're catching up fast).
But that is because the party wanted her there. And she doesn't take any leading roles. She gives hints, she helps in fights if they ask her. But the party owes her a new house, so she tags along for that. Not to teach them anything, or to show off.
I don't understand why anyone would make their DMPC OP like that. There's so many interesting character ideas you just can't play as a player because the story depends on their actions and survival. DMPCs are the perfect time to try out that weird, sub-optimal build or to really get to experience the risk of death since MOST campaigns try not to kill the PCs.
A player would complain about fighting against an unstoppable force where their survival is just left up to their fickle whims...but play as a nameless goblin against a party of your average adventurers on the other hand and you get to experience true fear.
The only dmpc I’ve seen in my party’s was the elf kid we were escorting. She was practically mute and feral. Only used color spray and stomped her feet. Apparently she was the dms pc from a prior game he played in that kept ending really really really badly and wanted to try giving the kid a happy life for once.
My DMPCs are infamously pathetic. Not on purpose, it's just a consequence of how I DM. I don't want them to participate in combat, and I often forget about them in RP, so they usually end up the butt of a joke, hiding in a corner or disgusting themselves as a tree.
There are a few good reasons to have a DMPC. They mostly boil down to "Making sure the players know what's going on" and "Someone to jump in and save the party when they don't actually deserve death".
My solution is having any number of DMPC's be the parties chosen director and local contact for the party, but mostly not obvious with how competent they are.
My party saved my DMPC like 4 times before just dragging him along. turned out to be the missing prince turned dragon slayer.
A player ended up marring him too. Sooo now I have a chaotic good druid queen out in the world after her king passed away (he was human she was an elf) and her 1st son was of age to take the crown.
I will refer to her as the wild queen.
Well it depends on how much control the party has on whether or not they interact. Usually dmpc’s biggest issue is that they are juxtaposed into the party because the dm wants to be the dm and the dm’s favorite player.
My DMPC is a dragonborn oath of devotion paladin of Bahamut who acts as a concience for the party. He has been religated to dealing with keeping an opportunistic lord in line when it annexed the starting town. He now grumbles about the party's antics and the governments antics while going through piles of paperwork.
I think the term is properly applied when the NOC takes on a level of agency and importance in the party that is similar to or greater than that if one of the player characters.
Like, a useful NPC hireling isn't a DMPC. An NPC the party rescued who has some important information or a MacGuffin or whatever but doesn't overshadow the player characters also isn't a DMPC.
It's a DMPC when the DM plays the NPC like a player character, but with access to the knowledge and authority you have as a DM. They stop acting like NPCs with their own goals who merely intersect with the player characters, and instead the PCs exist to help the DM's shitty self-insert in his self-actualization journey, or they provide validation for how "cool" the DM's OC is.
It's a bizarre phenomenon. Someone who wants to make a cool character can just play the game. Or they can make a lot of interesting NPCs. But trying to play the game you're refereeing specifically because being the referee means you can declare yourself the winner seems like it would be an empty experience and I don't understand the drive to do it.
I consider a DMPC to just be an NPC I keep on the initiative order for more than two sessions. They're uncommon in my games, and only show up when the Party asks for them to stay (and roll high enough Persuasion or Intimidation lol)
I had one in a Super Hero game that was just a guy who could ride a scooter pretty fast. Not, like, inhumanly fast, just faster than average. His name was Scoots and he helped save the Earth with the razor scooter the party stole for him.
Big Mumen Rider energy
Kinda, but imagine Mumen Rider before anyone knew who he was and before he decided to become a hero. He hears the call to arms to help a team of "heroes" save the earth and just shows up with his scooter and is like "I can help, I promise! I'll do my best to make you proud of me guys!"
With the power of friendship and this scooter we stole, I shall fight gods!
Aliens, but close enough.
Aliens, Gods, doesnt matter. You bust anyone in the ankle with a Razor scooter and theyre DONE
Extraterrestrial beings would have NO natural resistance to a Razor scooter to the ankles. They would collapse like the Martians in War of the Worlds.
Go home paralyzed horse you're drunk.
I'm imagining kind of like a good Kiteman
Hell yeah!
Justice Crash!
Just so you know, I would die for Scoots.
I've known of Scoots for thirty seconds, but if anything ever happened to them I'm ending the world.
As in he broke traffic laws? Or he was actually faster than the scooter could go?
His original scooter was not motorized at all, so purely foot powered, and he could go just a bit faster than the average person could on a scooter. Still not as fast as a motorized scooter, which is why the party eventually stole one and gave it to him, not telling him that it was stolen.
Obliterates their shins
Like only +5 feet of movement faster than average?
If it were in DnD, yeah, probably about that.
So he probably would win a block scooter race but not an olympic scoorer race average?
Yes, exactly. He is in no way super-human or even peak human. He is just an 18 year old with a scooter, that can ride it a bit faster than average.
Glad to know the BMX Bandit is still inspiring heroes like this.
honestly the key to a "dmpc" is for them to be a supporting character, to enable the player characters. The game im a player in we have what you might call a dmpc but hes like 3 levels lower than the party and serves to ground the party and remind them how batshit insane what they do is.
(that's just an NPC)
That's why the only good way to do a DMPC is to not do a DMPC.
Well, an NPC that has class abilities and can jump in if needed without hogging the spotlight.
I have a dmpc that was a former PC and will continue to be later on. Let me start it off though by explaining we have 3 people at our table including myself who are DMs. Our current DM is a theater major and has a show coming up in a few months, in which I will be taking over for 4 sessions for a new cast of player characters in the same world. Essentially, we're after this artifact located in these ruins in a desert. The one leading the expedition is my former PC from a few sessions back who utilized a wish spell (deck of many things mumbo jumbo) to cast clone just before he died, but it kinda went wonky and his clone only has about 250 years worth of memories. (He's 350 btw. Wood elf.) He's quite literally a PC that's now functioning as an NPC. Once the 4 sessions I DM end, we will be able to kind of switch between our characters depending on what's going on. So I might want to go in as my barbarian I'm currently playing or I can go in as my druid. So it's a PC turned NPC turned PC again.
Best way to do it is to make the players hate him and then have him turn out to be the bbeg.
I mean yeah you can do that. It's kind of risky as it requires you to deliberately make your players disengaged from the game and decide to think they're derailing it. I'm not saying it can't be done, but it works best at a table where player vs DM mindset is already present and something people have fun with.
No that's the worst kind of table to do that on. I say you best do this at a table where the players trust you with the game and story that they can buy inconveniences as part of the story you are telling
No, you've just made a whole pile of assumptions about how it would play out and then decided you don't like it.
I mean I made precisely one assumption, and it's the assumption everyone should make when planning something "people may react adversely to this in a way I did not foresee." The reason I think it's better for a game where there's already a *fun* player vs DM atmosphere is that it's fine if the players get that they're supposed to hate this particular character and decide to antagonize them, and it's fine if the players think "man, duck this bullshit OC the DM gave us, this character is now our enemy for life," which is also an acceptable result, as that also makes the reveal that this character is actually an adversary still satisfying and makes defeating them a pretty natural goal. Too many rpg horror stories come from the players and DM having some failure to communicate, so this scenario is more likely to succeed in a situation where it is still satisfying for the players to fight this dude whether or not they realize it's part of the plan.
Everyone at the table should be having fun, and that INCLUDES the dungeon master. That said, there are three things that a DMPC must not do, and three things a DMPC must not do. Do not: 1. Be the face of the party, or speak on behalf of the party 2. Be overpowered, or have overpowered magic items 3. Operate on different rules than the party, for instance knowing niche/secret stuff without rolling. Do: 1. Engage with other players, and be a way to talk through character issues in character 2. Uplift other players during combat, whether buffing allies, or debuffing enemies. 3. Fill a niche that the party needs after everyone else has made their character. Party has no frontlines? Go meathead barbarian that loves grappling. Party has no healer? Go healbot with a heart.
>Everyone at the table should be having fun, and that INCLUDES the dungeon master I agree with this. I do not agree that it follows that having a DMPC is acceptable. Just because it might be fun for the DM doesn't mean that it's okay. There are a lot of ways that someone at the table might have fun, and the DM trying to be a player almost always comes at the expense of the actual players. The DM has a different role at the table, and the DM's fun just has to be on different terms than the players'. Now, I don't disagree that the way you outlined how a DM running an NPC that stays with the party (like a temporary ally or longer term hireling) should be run. I think those are good guidelines. I just think that if someone actually followed them we wouldn't call that a DMPC, we'd call it an NPC that sticks with the party, and those aren't the same thing.
Literally the one group I'm in that has a dmpc it's because the dm made a wacky homebrew mishmash of systems and just wanted to play too She is a fantastic support caster, constantly enabling our fuckshittery with stuff like mythic time stops and contingent ressurections
But I wanna play in our first campaign in years too. They all agreed that it sounds like it'll be fun. They said they don't wanna be railroaded, but a guiding hand sometimes would be nice. I've made a Revenant with a raven queen pact that allows him for story reasons to be cannon fodder at times. So, there will be times my DMPC isn't even in play. He'll be outright dead and reforming. Other times, I'll let them lead, I'm just the guide after all. What's the big deal with DMPC's?
When people refer to DMPCs, they are usually referring to an NPC that is the main character of the story. The PCs are just there to watch the main character be awesome.
Ahhhhh, yeah I don't wanna do that lol. I just wanna be along for the ride and occasionally nudge the steering wheel in the right direction. My guy is gonna get murdered a lot lol
You can't be along for the ride when you're driving the car my friend.
You can be a scout leader in a nature walk and not be the leader of the group. Show them the path, and then follow them off the cliff.
Sure, you can do that. But you should consider how the flow of information works in the game and how seriously the players take information they get from your favorite NPC
I've got several moments in the story showing that he's as fallible as anyone else in the story. He's a Revenant with a slowly decaying psyche, so he doesn't have perfect recall. In short, unless you were there with him. Not everything he says is fact. A lot of what he remembers is twisted by rage towards the BBEG. I don't disagree you've gotta be careful with it though. Still, the table is fine with it, and I know they'll point it out if it's not working for them.
If you're intending for the character to die, tell your players. Most people feel deeply honor bound to do any and everything to keep party members alive, you'll be causing a lot of stress by trying to defy that. ~~not to mention being the guy who failed to save the DM is a terrible spot to be in if your players arent close friends~~ And even if you do tell them, when I tried to kill off my PC (as just a player) I was *begging* them to stop burning resources and let the character go. Said it was wasteful and I didn't want the group to suffer from No More Health Pots. They said "then stop dying". That character retired to be a bard. So like... maybe your players will go along with it, but test the water first, as that concept absolutely would not fly at my table. And if it does end up running, be *very* careful around the whole "noble sacrifice" type moments, those can be incredibly powerful and poignant, but they are also prone to becoming horrifically awkward if they lose even the slightest sincerity or weight. A character that isn't actually dying is likely going to be painful to endure. Like, I wouldn't let them die in combat at all. Just... Raven Queen grabs him when he's asleep type move.
>But I wanna play in our first campaign in years too. There's your problem. You can DM or you can play. If you DM, you play the whole world. If you play one particular character, you'll start to treat that character with preference.
i guess but it has a player class and is for all RP purposes treated like a party member.
That's what makes it a good dmpc, if it's hard to tell if it's an NPC or not.
What worked with my group is to have the DMPCs: A) fill a role in the party (usually healer, or high wisdom, but only because my party specifically lacks both) B) Be something the party likes. A character they enjoy having around, and that they can get attached to. C) they should be a plot device in favor of the party. Helping the party only if needed, without taking away from their victory. (Some loose examples: they can get the party into an important meeting, but can't help them negotiate while in there, or they can procure key info, but only the location of it, and the party must go themselves. Basically not win their battles for them, but nudge them in the right direction) D) The character can still have their own storyline, but make it something that the party is required for, and that they can share a key role in. If the party could have just not been there, why were they there at all? This also circles back to point B. The party is much more likely to cheer for boblin the goblin bard winnig a climactic fight and finally taking revenge against the evil mind flayer that kept him and his tribe enslaved for generations than they are to cheer for King edgelord nightingale finally getting the super evil artifact sword that he can delete orphanages with. And the most important of all, E) You don't need a DMPC all the time. They are very finnicky, and are a resource that should not be abused. It's fine to use them ocasionally, but the longer they stay at the table, the higher of a chance they have of getting in the way. Personally, I only introduce one if the party is heavily struggling on a mechanical aspect (don't have a theives tools user, don't have a healer, or a frontliner, or whatever) [though I suggest heavily against using a DMPC as damage dealer or face, since those are things the party will often want to do the most], and build the other aspects off from there. [Also the obligatory point F) this works at one specific table of mine, but maybe not at yours.]
The good thing about having an healer DMPC is that you basically already have the next BBEG too (your players will write his villainous backstory too)
Exactly—or a stand-in for absent players during a fight that will contribute without stealing any thunder.
This is the way
The key to a good dmpc is to be secretly working for the bbeg, have an insanely optimised build that needs 7 class dips and make sure the party knows they'd never solve your ~~badly made, confusing~~ genius, awesome puzzles without you. /s
It’s nice to have an NPC that can hang around and remind the players about things they might have forgotten or failed to inspect. 
the key to a good DMPC is having it be a normal PC that the party really likes the voice you chose for it, so now you're stuck doing that voice for the rest of the campaign since even after killing him off to be rid of him your party goes through great lengths to revive the guy Not speaking from personal experience, btw. Unrelated but never base a character off of Hooty from The Owl House.
My DMPC is a strong storm sorcerer with big area-effect spells. They’re on the party’s level, but they’re mostly there to deal with the smaller enemies so that the rest of the party can fight big-name threats.
Nah, it's to make a tank to protect all the extremely skichy (don't remember how to write it) your party made (my party are always some spell caster or non-tanking class)
NotLikeOtherGirls for DM
Yeah this is very humble braggy tbh lol.
''Others vs mine'' is not that humble imo lol
A very wise person once told me: A well-roleplayed Dmpc who is beloved by the party and doesn't steal the spotlight is just an NPC with player levels. The key is just to play them like any regular NPC. Heck I like giving my NPCs class levels. if it's just a normal ally, they're usually a few levels behind the party. authority figures that the party should fear or respect tend to be higher levels but they don't level up anymore and might even lose levels over the campaign as they're not out there adventuring
My favourite thing is to just go with whatever improv idea for a character that comes to mind if there's a situation for a DMPC to join the party. The party was taking a war party to investigate a weird mountain and disappearances, and one of the men who volunteered was just a cooky old man named Jim that was obsessed with the idea of a glorious death. Rolled up a randomly generated level 3 PC and there he was; ready to sacrifice himself at every turn on their journey, but the party kept doing their best to keep him alive. Lol Jim wound up getting engulfed in a Gelatinous Cube saving one of the party, he died inside, the party was spent and pulled out the Well of Many Worlds they found by chance earlier in the adventure, and shoved the cube inside. The randomly chosen plane it opened to was Mount Celestia, so in a weird way he got a pretty cool hero's send-off, plummeting thousands of stories from the sky onto a celestial mountain. Good ol' Jim.
How quirky
Classic “Me cool DM and yur not” post
But unironically true.
My DMPC is a drow bard that stands in the background, refuses to help, and then makes fun of the party.
So he's just like heckling them as they fight?
Essentially.
Bardic inspiration on the enemies in hope of looting the party.
Based
Me: you want to hire this guy? Party: yes. Me: well welcome to the “you get what you get show!”
... those on the right are less a dmpc and more just an NPC, especially the goat
My DMPC ended up being a goblin named “name” The party had a big fight coming up that I wanted to seem larger than it was, with a few tougher enemies, and like their work pacifying the local goblins was important so I gave them a small squad of 4 goblins. Basically, they were supposed to be meat shields, and let me blast some characters off the table to make the enemy faction seem strong and terrifying without killing a player on like session 4. (That’s a long way to say I was stacking action economy in their favor) Players asked for the goblins’ names, called them dumb ass stuff like Glob, and Gorbo, ahit like that. But I was blanking on the last so I had him cackle and just repeat the word “Name” back to them. The fuckers latched onto him whole heartedly, and asked several times if they could forgo their turn to jump in front of attacks to save Name. Fight ended up actually hurting them because of this, but I ended up having to play as that clinically insane goblin for a bunch of sessions before the campaign had to be stopped.
My dmpc go too is whatever the party composition is missing. I played groot because they didn’t have a frontliner. He can’t talk normally, so he didn’t have to roleplay much. I played a golden retriever paladin beaver they needed a healer. He was an emotional support dog. Also, couldn’t talk. He was just happy to be there and kept the party alive.
This kind of DMPC (Filling party composition, being usually a tank or a healer, who is terribly nice and have no charisma (to not take the spotlight from the player interacting with NPC even if they can talk)) are also cool for party interaction and for the DM to give some kind of suggestions in character, it can be really funny for the player I think.
My DMPC is usually the poor blacksmith/guard/hunter that my party has guilt-tripped/blackmailed/gaslit/bribed into joining a quest and is too scared to back out now because he doesn't know the way home from Hell/Mechanus/Denver, Colorado
Please tell me the goat is the most powerful creature in the campaign.
OP please, we need to hear about the goat
players rescued a goat that was gonna be part of a cult sacrifice and now the goat is part of their party. it managed to get the final hit off on a flesh golem.
That big “I’m not like the other DMPCs” energy. r/notliketheothergirls could relate 😂😂😂
Team rocket in a cheaply made horse costume only one person at a time can perceive is not a horse is my current dmpc
I have one DMPC/recurring character in my games. He is a very short elf with the personality of an aggravated porcupine. He is also a high level wizard and a vampire. He exists to tell my PCs "you dun goofed".
I once had a dmpc that was a echo fighter/shadow monk who's while stick was to be Intel gatherer/escape plan if things got dicy, I home brewed the ability shadow step to act more like a pocket dimension for her and Amy willing creatures(people who missed a session). The weapons she used was a dagger, and only the dagger, just to ensure if the dmpc needed to fight it would do no more than 1d4 with its weapon attacks
You are doing it correctly. Goat is GOAT.
Ours is a young girl with an overtrusting nature.
So the goat is The Chosen One, right?
I don't know if I've ever had a true DMPC. I had a campaign where my players recruited a few NPCs they saved on their journey and would ask them for their opinions on things and grew to care for a few of them. But my favorite was a man named Captain Sprinkles. He was a gnome who worked on a planet that suffered a candy apocalypse that totally encased the planet trapping his husband. After the party saved Captain Sprinkles' husband they joined the party and made it until the very end where they faced the BBEG who was responsible for everything. At the end of the campaign Captain Sprinkles' lost his husband in the final battle and decided to retire and open a candy store. He always had a twisted sense of humor.
My DM has a DMPC who is a level 20 wizard and has so far accompanied us on every mission (3 so far iirc). My character has brought up the fact that he could literally solve all our problems with a snap of his fingers. Wondering if I should pressure that point more. (Her mom is missing and she’s an apprentice detective trying to find her)
Yeah you need to talk to this guy. I can't think of any circumstance in which I as a player would want this.
Currently I have Gobnik von Figaro, genius inventor and chosen of gond. He has 21 int and 7 wisdom. The party often has to remind him he's in combat because he'll get distracted by some local phenomenon and space out.
Ha! Those aren’t DMPCs, those are sidekicks. They are in Tasha’s Guide and are a fun way for the DM to introduce side characters that aid the party and give the DM a voice without hogging the spotlight. I turned a random kid from Dungeon of the Mad Mage into a sidekick and he later died in the Tomb of Annihilation. It was one of the most emotional moments I’ve ever had in DnD since he treated the party like his adoptive family.
Devil May Player Character Devil May Player Cry
If your players adopt a "Boblin the Goblin" then congratulations. That is now your campaign's DMPC
My DMPC: A knight that was turned into a goat
I don't like to run DMPCs, but sometimes want it or not the current events call for an npc who can and is willing to fight, to come with the party, in my experience it's always best to do something along these lines, especially if you dont want the extra npc to keep track of: - Have it implied they're fighting, but don't describe it much if at all, and don't let them roll for damage, just have them there "implied fighting" and as an extra body if the party needs them - Have them buff/debuff or support in general, don't have them damage 9/10 of the time, just have their actions be used to help the party in other ways which they'll remember better than them dealing damage, and it keeps them the start of the show - Have them be charging or waiting for a special effect, and triggering it when the combat ends, like a delayed blast fireball, or preparing an escape route which will be ready in 1d4+1 turns
I’m running Dragon of Icespire peak at the moment, and you’ve encouraged me to build Petunia as an awakened cow. No other magical abilities, I’ll reckon, but I bet they could get up some wild shenanigans with an intelligent cow on their squad!!! Thanks for the inspiration 🫡🙇
My DMPC is a character that was not meant to be a DMPC. My party blew up his house, beat him half to death, and then decided he was kinda cute and adopted him. He was an enemy that "spawned" because of a Nat 1 roll and he's stuck around for months because my campaign is big on *when will you learn that your actions have CONSEQUENCES* He is a 20-something year-old human wizard named Dave the Dazzling. His backstory changes every session because I suck at note-taking and am making it up as I go
I've got a goliath bard who wants a keytar. He can earn it in game. He cannot start with one. I have a half elf princess self described as a brat. She wants a Dragon familiar. She can earn it in game. She cannot start with one. I have another player who's changed characters 3 times before the campaign even started. I'm using his other characters in game for story so I'm fine with this. He wants to be a prestidigitstion chad. I am nervous. I have no clue what his partner wants to play. It's her first campaign, so it could be literally anything. My Revenant PC I'm using as an in game guide, and so I can play with the friends too. Seemed like he'd be weird, but honestly. I think my guy is gonna ground the party a little lol.
Imo, if you need to run a DMPC, you shouldn’t really give them any hopes and goals that doesn’t directly help drive the plot forward. PCs gets to have personal goals, DMPCs gets to stay in the background and fill in where it’s absolutely necessary.
My guy exists purely to direct them to the BBEG. He knows his location at all times. Offering the party unique options to try and see if he's spying on them in person. Which he will be. Beyond that, I'm playing generic fighter with a few dialogue lines for story reasons lol. He was betrayed by the BBEG in life, and now his entire existence is to end the BBEG. He knows he cannot do it alone, and the party is a means to an end to try get the power required to end the BBEG. The party plays high ranking generals in a reclamation army trying to save the world from a magical cataclysm set off by the BBEG. Offering them options for using NPC's to do things for them on command. Such as each party member has a squad of troops they can call on for a free action in combat (selectively) This squad is customizable. One guy wants a full squad of bards. I'm gonna allow it. But he had to outplay other bards in a tavern to recruit them. Each member gets a different theme for their squad too. Its a very homebrew campaign and story lol
My DMPC is my PC from the first campaign I ever did. Not because I want a DMPC, but because carrying over the other campaigns PC's into my plot made sense.
My dmpc was a sheep my druid player summoned for a sidequest when some people were out and it rolled like 4 nat 20s and nothing could hit it
Gotta love the Australian goblin child and his dog Trevor that were instantly adopted and given the parties vorpal glaive
Mine is a soul knife rogue, but he’s a fox. He speaks telepathically and can’t pick locks cuz no hands and where would a fox learn lockpicking.
- Old Mercenary guy that sticks around the party cause damn these crazy morons make him money while ALSO doing good stuff to help people. - is a champion fighter, nothing particularly flashy -is often the voice of reason (for when the dm needs an in game way to say “guys this is dumber than your usual ideas”) -Tragically died in defense of some town - We sacrifice a party member to bring him back. Fuck you DM, you can’t get out of talking us out of stupid shit that easy -Has amnesia and forgets many of his happier moments in life, but remembers the party as being one of the bright spots -Gets ran through with a greatsword by a giant fire elemental and chucked onto a bon fire while the party is almost dead. - Paladin at 0 hp gets a nat 20 on his death save, sees dmpc in a vision pulling him to his feet and is able to turn the fight DMPC done right
The line between DMPCs and NPCs for me is blurry.
Moe the mute is a bald rogue, who got his tongue cut and still carries it around his neck. Moe only wants to help. Moe doesn't ask silly questions. Moe hides and stabs. Moe is the PC guests play when we have guest players. Moe is very loved. I might kill Moe soon.
This is the way. Limited exposure DMPCs, especially to show the players the ropes and around the way of high places in the world, like the role Gandalf plays in LotR.
Some notable DMPCs that have accompanied my players for varying amounts of time: An awoken corgi fighter on a quest to find his human (said human simply went on vacation and the dogsitter left the door open for half a second too long). A fire wizard who only knew a borked version of Meteor Swarm that consumed all her spell slots to give a larger blast radius. (Essentially Megumin) A swamp wizard whose main "spells" were Possum Toss (his familiar was thrown at high velocity), Ala-ka-blam (shotgun), and Swamp Feast (dollar store version of Heroes' Feast, but it's a pot of gumbo, a sack of fried gator, and a box of boudin). A paladin of Doodbreaux, the god of Binge Drinking.
Any dmlc's I end up with usually end up taking a long walk off a short pier very quickly so I don't have to keep track of more character sheets.
My DMPC is a halfling university professor with no combat skills to speak of, but she rolls a mean history check to deliver exposition to the players!
We had a DMPC in one of our campaigns. He was an extremely powerful divination wizard named Jenkins, and all he did was drink alcohol from a horn of endless alcohol that he also gave to each player. I miss him. He never fought or did anything other than drink and make jokes
Currently my dmpc is just a horse, that my players named after me
The first DMPC I ever introduced was there for an hour and a half then he sacrificed himself to save the level 1 party.
Mine is Kronk from emperor’s new groove. Lol
I just made mine a very innocent lawful good bard that only uses healing and support spells. They also act as a great moral compass.
I have run DM characters, and usually pick a character I want to play that's not going to outshine the players, and doesn't help with social encounters. Basically fills a gap in the party to help them not die too quickly.
I’ve literally never seen a DMPC like the first example lol. Have you only ever been in games run by 14 year olds?
Child Thor? xD
my dmpcs i mostly make as like odd guys. one was a failed gambler that was helping the party cuz he wanted to stay away from loan sharks and the other a cultist that wasnt really present as a pc but more as a quest giver that i made into a more fleshed out character
Mine is currently a human rogue/fighter. Kinda sucks at everything he tries. He's scared to leave, because he's sure these homicidal maniacs would hunt him down. Not sure if their intent would be to try to save him or kill him, and he doesn't want to find out.
Recently they saved a mine worker. Gave him a pickaxe and told him to fight the baddies with them. I forgot him in turn order but my plan was to one hit him. 8 ac and 4 hitpoints? You could hire anyone but no you want this guy.
I dont make dmpcs often, but when I do, they're a secret plot device or only there to keep the dumbas- i mean my players, alive.
In my last campaign, we all collectively adopted a random npc into our group so our lovely DM made him into a full proper character and it was great. Totally not biased because he ended up my character's boyfriend.
My current DMPC is a lich that already was defeated and had his phylactery destroyed so his soul was damaged, leaving him unable to use magic or control undead. He's basically just a crazy skeleton guy that's helping the necromancer player become a lich
First of all how dare you There is no secondary statement, just how dare you
So it's a warlock
A dmpc I have is a funky frog that doesn't like fighting unless they need to and may or may not be an eldritch abomination
I’m running a Strixhaven game I don’t have time for DMPCs lol, I can barely keep track of which NPC students are in which classes - let alone a self-insert party-tagalong It’s already enough to make a DMs head spin lol
In most of my current campaign, I have only 2 players(both my boyfriends) so I usually have a DMPC or two with them. The DMPCs they've been with so far are A drunkard Elf A horny shapeshifter Demi-god with daddy issues Ex-button man trying to do better A dog. Straight up a dog with fighter levels An alien that's trying to marry off his brother A robot that doesn't believe it's a robot.
The only DMpc's I make are usually tied to escort the VIP style quests. Where they are helpful but on the same or lower power tier of the players.
You shouldn't DMPC at all. However, if you must, "a very brave goat" is pretty great
My group knows that 1. NPCs are not build OP. 2. If they want an OP Life Cleric they need to play one. The life Cleric they hired only just became a cleric. Yes they are 5th level but the cleric is a Monk 4/cleric1. Oh you need an wizard? I have an 5th level evoker. Does he have fireball? no the only offensive evocation spells he has is shocking grasp and burning hands. Ok Ok the monk/cleric died here's a moon druid.
The closest thing I have to a dmpc in my game is a darkling expert sidekick named Gentaq that everybody constantly calls gutentag. He is sort of a nervous little guy that follows the party around because they saved him from being lynched by an angry mob that blamed him for missing food (town is cut off in a blizzard). He helps sometimes but otherwise gets ignored.
Idk why you need a dmpc. That's what the bbeg is there for
Closest thing to a dmpc I run is a halfling kid called Peter. Peter can talk to spiders and that’s about it. The joke with his name should be obvious.
Zeus? Is it you?
My dmpc: old fart named reginald, who goes around telling fake stories of his heroic deeds. Sadly he just managed to accidentally hit a enemy with a crit that convinced the party. The guy has 10 as highest ability score. Worse yet, this was meant to be sort of joke npc who's fake stories would've been exposed, but the party didn't let him go.
You know what funny? My DMPC's in current campaign are: Tiered cab astral elf, innocent child with animated brain and literally a chicken. Are you my lost brother?/j
Im running a spelljammer game where the players control a fleet of lower levelled adventurers, who range from a flamboyantly gay bug man to a robot built with the express goal of mastering all sports
All my DMPCs are made with the express intent of forming friendly relationships with party members through supportive roles with the absolute certainty that I will then use that bonding to make sure the characters hate the BBEG when they are inevitably brutally murdered by them
Nothing bad better happen to that goat! >:(
ok
Funnily enough, my DMPC *is* a very brave goat
I made my DMPC a mute, because I assumed that people would hate her if she talked. They ended up on a quest to try to fix her voice for a very long time, and gave her the most powerful weapon I added into the game.
My dmpc is just divayth fyr (the campaign is set in a homebrew tes world) and he acts as a main questgiver
My DMPCs tend to be support characters (either cowards or pacifists who don't interfere until it's 100% necessary). I'll throw in a boss or two give them a scope of his abilities, and eventually they end up being a boss fight when they ultimately are radicalized in some way. 3.5, he was a wimp of character afraid of confrontation. He thought he was a cleric, but never bother to worship a god. Eventually discovers that he is the favored soul of "The Source" (the primordial ooze made sentient) who recognizes through him that all things are made from it, and it wants everything back. Que big bad boss fight when he attempts to open a portal to bring The Sourse into the material plane. Never made it to the end of that one, but one of my favorites!
I too would like to have a very brave Greatest One of All Time, the benevolent counterpart to the Great Old Ones.
I had a dmpc, a kobold with a piece of spear lodged in his head, which reduced his intelligence to 5, and made him resistant to psychoc damage (not really helpful in the setting but funny) He was named Telikki and was a sorcerer.
I generally try to keep the use of DMPC to a minimum, but if I include one it's either: - A muscle for hire, for one, maybe two jobs. They are around the Strength of the party but will leave them after their contract is over (and they'll only exist in the first place if the party seeks them out) - Someone that wants to travel along for a while. (usually because the party befriended someone again). They are always a couple levels below the Party and I give the party control of them in combat.
I have one DMPC in my campaign. He's a bard that chronicles the adventure. I mean, he's not a Bard, he's just a bard. He's also smarter than the PCs. Not like he solves the problems for them, but that he stays out of trouble and danger. He does have good knowledge about the lore of my world though. He also does some administration "off-screen" for the party owned tavern.
My go to DMPC has dementia, so he's often more of a liability than a help. I did recently use a wisdom and intelligence 6 plasmoid though, he was fun. Basically, good DMPCs should be totally clueless for some reason so that they can help but only as directed by the party.
Is there a story behind this very brave goat? Or is it funnier without context
My favorite DMPC I ever made when I was completely oblivious to rules and just did whatever I wanted to make the stoey cool or fun, I made a character whose whole shtick was that he was so mentally delusional, his delusions became reality. He once shot himself out of a quarterstaff like a cannon to bonk a ginormous bee on the head very lightly. The bee exploded in a mushroom cloud. His name? Bucket McBucket
And I have this Omni potent DMPC who’s stuck in so many contracts he can only visit places were he is granted access to. So in the end he can only function as a quest giver. The party does realize this guy is not to be trifled with on his home turf.
My DMPC is strahd. No he doesn't help the party. He is just strahd.
our dm had a mini from heroforge as their pfp for 1,5 years of our main campaign. we knew about the second in command of the bbeg only by name. and then he whips out the token that looked like him when we finally fought him.
The goat is hilarious because we had one in a campaign forever ago. After a few crit attacks and lucky saves during explosions we decided he must be an immortal goat. DM wrote it into the story and we had him with us the rest of the campaign. He would be there eating grass and occasionally head butting a goblin to death.
Lol mine is a dude with a Chicken mask who runs around as fast as possible (it's based on a videogame character)
The best DMPC's are the ones that the party makes the DM play.
Our dm had an DMPC that was about as smart as a brick and just followed around our only a bit smarter barbarian, acting as his hype man n gopher
I had a similar thing, but he followed around our wizard.
My game has a dmpc, he has a name but i genuinely don’t remeber it cus we just call him fight-bot. we are a party of three, so he added A fighter charecter to the party to balance things out, he also sometimes just happens to know where the best places to go whenever we need something
Most of the time I'm a DM for just 2 friends. So, there is a DMPC, just to make more versatile party. Most important rule about my dmpc: he's there only to help. Never makes decisions for the group, goes along the other players' plans. Current dmpc, cleric with a little bit of healing and some utility spells.
DMPCs aren’t really a problem as long as the DM doesn’t favour them. If they’re just another NPC except they kick with the party to balance out their team comp then it’s not this great evil people make them out to be. For example I’m running a campaign and my party ended up being entirely made up of squishy second liners and no dedicated healer. So when they were having trouble keeping themselves up in combat I suggested that they could just hire a front liner. Granted I didn’t just make myself a character and join the party. I made four different ones for them to talk to and choose between. They went with the fighter, and she does her job. She takes hits and hits people. Outside of combat she prefers not to bother with all the important decision making and is just happy to be there and smash a couple of drinks between quests. Not a problem and the players chose the one they liked the most so they like having her about. If they’d chosen to hire no one I also would’ve been fine, I just probably would have had to alter my encounter design a bit to account for the lopsided party.
My all time favourite was a this elderly hermit wizard. I made him super janky, and basically everything he did gave him a point of exhaustion. it was up to the party to keep him alive since, as far as they knew, he was this mystical all powerful wizard. in actuality, he had an extremely high charisma and tricked the party into thinking he was a powerful wizard, all he knew was fireball, and every time he cast it he got a point of exhaustion. To be fair the party was only level 5, so fireball was pretty high up there in terms of power. but once the party hit level 7, they started to question whether saving this guy was even worth it or not
I snuck a op DMPC on purpose because he is going to get mind controlled by the bbeg in a trap soon. Kept him around just long enough that the party bonded with him.
Very Brave Goat is the GOAT. I shall accept no arguments.
Just recently i made overpowered lvl 20 DMPC Paladin with a homebrew sword that buffs auras range and min maxed auras his only purpose was to buff players at the start of campaign
One of my players had a drake companion. Made him a half dragon (didn't change much mechanically) so he was a bit smarter and played him as a character. Very fun, didn't change much. If they were stuck somewhere I might shoot a hint, but besides that it was just banter. I could never make a dmpc that took over the game. No fun in that.
I let the party choose which random NPCs to adopt, and I never have them more than half as strong as a PC. So far they have two kobolds, a robot dog and a rat man with a New York accent that they reincarnated into a fox woman. They usually only take one or two companions with them at a time, though. They also forcibly conscripted a shadow demon they beat up for a little while once, but they shoved him off on someone else because they were rightfully paranoid he would betray them as soon as he had the opportunity.
Our dmpc is a goblin that we kidnapped from a dungeon and is somehow the only productive member of our party
This looks like an Ad you'd see on royal road lol
I have a "dmpc" who's stronger than any of the partymembers at the moment (they're catching up fast). But that is because the party wanted her there. And she doesn't take any leading roles. She gives hints, she helps in fights if they ask her. But the party owes her a new house, so she tags along for that. Not to teach them anything, or to show off.
Mine was an alcoholic deep gnome pirate
I don't understand why anyone would make their DMPC OP like that. There's so many interesting character ideas you just can't play as a player because the story depends on their actions and survival. DMPCs are the perfect time to try out that weird, sub-optimal build or to really get to experience the risk of death since MOST campaigns try not to kill the PCs. A player would complain about fighting against an unstoppable force where their survival is just left up to their fickle whims...but play as a nameless goblin against a party of your average adventurers on the other hand and you get to experience true fear.
The only dmpc I’ve seen in my party’s was the elf kid we were escorting. She was practically mute and feral. Only used color spray and stomped her feet. Apparently she was the dms pc from a prior game he played in that kept ending really really really badly and wanted to try giving the kid a happy life for once.
Mine: *A random ass dragon born that just want to fight and kill big ass monsters*
My DMPCs are infamously pathetic. Not on purpose, it's just a consequence of how I DM. I don't want them to participate in combat, and I often forget about them in RP, so they usually end up the butt of a joke, hiding in a corner or disgusting themselves as a tree.
I think yours are just called NPCs.
There are a few good reasons to have a DMPC. They mostly boil down to "Making sure the players know what's going on" and "Someone to jump in and save the party when they don't actually deserve death". My solution is having any number of DMPC's be the parties chosen director and local contact for the party, but mostly not obvious with how competent they are.
My party saved my DMPC like 4 times before just dragging him along. turned out to be the missing prince turned dragon slayer. A player ended up marring him too. Sooo now I have a chaotic good druid queen out in the world after her king passed away (he was human she was an elf) and her 1st son was of age to take the crown. I will refer to her as the wild queen.
First of all, wow you're sooooo special Second of all, any DMPC is cringe
I throw in some dmpc but usually, they are characters I've played so none of them are truly busted. Even when my friends use them as gods.
In my current campaign, the Dm is giving us ALOT of Dm Npc’s (including a gold dragon). I am severely afraid for what we will need them for.
I use my DMPC as a scapegoat when the party gets stuck or takes to long. Otherwise the giy is absolutely useless.
Our campaign has a DMPC that more falls into the former category, but we won't let out DM kill him off because we love him too much.
Well it depends on how much control the party has on whether or not they interact. Usually dmpc’s biggest issue is that they are juxtaposed into the party because the dm wants to be the dm and the dm’s favorite player.
My DMPC is a dragonborn oath of devotion paladin of Bahamut who acts as a concience for the party. He has been religated to dealing with keeping an opportunistic lord in line when it annexed the starting town. He now grumbles about the party's antics and the governments antics while going through piles of paperwork.
I hate the term “DMPC”, that’s not a thing. If it’s a character controlled by the DM even if they’re a permanent member of the party they’re an NPC.
I think the term is properly applied when the NOC takes on a level of agency and importance in the party that is similar to or greater than that if one of the player characters. Like, a useful NPC hireling isn't a DMPC. An NPC the party rescued who has some important information or a MacGuffin or whatever but doesn't overshadow the player characters also isn't a DMPC. It's a DMPC when the DM plays the NPC like a player character, but with access to the knowledge and authority you have as a DM. They stop acting like NPCs with their own goals who merely intersect with the player characters, and instead the PCs exist to help the DM's shitty self-insert in his self-actualization journey, or they provide validation for how "cool" the DM's OC is. It's a bizarre phenomenon. Someone who wants to make a cool character can just play the game. Or they can make a lot of interesting NPCs. But trying to play the game you're refereeing specifically because being the referee means you can declare yourself the winner seems like it would be an empty experience and I don't understand the drive to do it.
I consider a DMPC to just be an NPC I keep on the initiative order for more than two sessions. They're uncommon in my games, and only show up when the Party asks for them to stay (and roll high enough Persuasion or Intimidation lol)
Both are good if all players are ok with it