I've been toying with the idea of adding the dungeonmaster as an NPC in a campaign I'm running, with my inspiration being the 80's D&D cartoon. I want him to seem mystical, yet still human at the same time, and clearly incredibly powerful, but I don't know how I could design him in a way where he hits all the checkboxes and still doesn't break the game. Thoughts?
I suggest you make this NPC purely narrative. Any interaction in combat or puzzles would break something.
I think about the Luminous Being from Forgotten Realms, who was merely mentioned. Perhaps the interaction between Ao (or something like it in your world) and TLB can be used a bit. TLB tells Ao to go do something through the gods. The party finds out and quests to figure it out. Something like that. Anything more direct and you'll be wrecking the players' agency.
If you give something stats, there's the possibility that your players will try to kill it. If it's like the guy from the D&D cartoon, that possibility is at least 95%.
The "incredibly powerful magic being who's always following the characters around to be cryptic at them and occasionally help" trope is one that's very hard to pull off. The boundary between "if you're so powerful, why are we doing your busywork?" and "Deus Ex Machina who renders the players' actions irrelevant" is... quite thin.
Much the same role can be done by a powerful, but explicitly normal, mentor/employer. If you must have such a being, I think you need to give it limitations to explain why the PCs are doing things for it, and why it can't help them out. Some ideas off the top of my head: "Doesn't exist on the physical plane", "Can only manifest in specific locations", "Must be explicitly summoned, which isn't quick"
Make the DM a L20 Halfling Divination Wizard that gained the Sanctuary spell from a Feat, and the Subtle Spell Metamagic from another Feat, and has an Intelligence of 40+ (he has several Tomes of Clear Thought that he's read a few times), so the DC to attack him is DC29+. Until higher levels, it's literally impossible for them to attack him.
He pops in to give the party a quest, and some reason why they have to do it, and give them clues that they'll need to be successful, and then he subtle-casts teleport to leave before the Sanctuary wears off.
After realizing that even a natural 20 doesn't make their check high enough to attack him, and that he's just going to talk and then leave, they'll probably just let him, and maybe even do the quests he assigned them, especially if there's always appropriate rewards at the end.
One time I was in a campaign where the DM introduced an npc wizard they were super proud of and they thought we'd have a lot of fun with. The wizard was stronger than all of us, smarter than all of us, knew more about the plot than any of us, and if we did anything the npc didn't like, he cast hold person on all of us. We were level 3.
And don't forget about the archdevil Venger. I still can't decide how to set up his stat block, and whether or not he should have a lair, mythic actions, and so on. Also, should he just have every spell in the PHB, or just a selected list.
Depends what you're after. As others have suggested, having a powerful NPC follow the party around would be weird and can backfire quickly. However, if you're just trying to get more in-character interaction with the party, how about giving them a Sentient Weapon or other artefact with the ability to talk. It can contain whatever 'character' your DM NPC would be, and allows you to interact with the party in-character, but can't easily be killed or actively interfere.
This is a great idea. I once gave a minor magic weapon to a fighter in random loot. It wasn't that special, but it looked cool. The party finished their quest, but then spent about a year in real life developing a story about the sword. I wrote almost nothing myself. There were a few visions given to the fighter to direct them, but they ran with it and had a great time. If I really needed to get them back on track (to their own plot line), I would just send a vision. They had a great time, and it did half my job.
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I've been toying with the idea of adding the dungeonmaster as an NPC in a campaign I'm running, with my inspiration being the 80's D&D cartoon. I want him to seem mystical, yet still human at the same time, and clearly incredibly powerful, but I don't know how I could design him in a way where he hits all the checkboxes and still doesn't break the game. Thoughts?
Orange Juice!
I suggest you make this NPC purely narrative. Any interaction in combat or puzzles would break something.
I think about the Luminous Being from Forgotten Realms, who was merely mentioned. Perhaps the interaction between Ao (or something like it in your world) and TLB can be used a bit. TLB tells Ao to go do something through the gods. The party finds out and quests to figure it out. Something like that. Anything more direct and you'll be wrecking the players' agency.
If you give something stats, there's the possibility that your players will try to kill it. If it's like the guy from the D&D cartoon, that possibility is at least 95%.
The "incredibly powerful magic being who's always following the characters around to be cryptic at them and occasionally help" trope is one that's very hard to pull off. The boundary between "if you're so powerful, why are we doing your busywork?" and "Deus Ex Machina who renders the players' actions irrelevant" is... quite thin.
Much the same role can be done by a powerful, but explicitly normal, mentor/employer. If you must have such a being, I think you need to give it limitations to explain why the PCs are doing things for it, and why it can't help them out. Some ideas off the top of my head: "Doesn't exist on the physical plane", "Can only manifest in specific locations", "Must be explicitly summoned, which isn't quick"
Make the DM a L20 Halfling Divination Wizard that gained the Sanctuary spell from a Feat, and the Subtle Spell Metamagic from another Feat, and has an Intelligence of 40+ (he has several Tomes of Clear Thought that he's read a few times), so the DC to attack him is DC29+. Until higher levels, it's literally impossible for them to attack him.
He pops in to give the party a quest, and some reason why they have to do it, and give them clues that they'll need to be successful, and then he subtle-casts teleport to leave before the Sanctuary wears off.
After realizing that even a natural 20 doesn't make their check high enough to attack him, and that he's just going to talk and then leave, they'll probably just let him, and maybe even do the quests he assigned them, especially if there's always appropriate rewards at the end.
Great idea! I play the rule where a crit 20 is an instant success, so is there a feature that dodges around that fact?
Orange Juice!
One time I was in a campaign where the DM introduced an npc wizard they were super proud of and they thought we'd have a lot of fun with. The wizard was stronger than all of us, smarter than all of us, knew more about the plot than any of us, and if we did anything the npc didn't like, he cast hold person on all of us. We were level 3.
Don't be like that DM.
He can cast Silvery Barbs to force them to re-roll that natural 20, reducing the odds of any character being able to attack him from 1/20 to 1/400.
Just remember, Dungeon Master gave a bunch of 1st level characters magic weapons and then sent them off to fight Tiamat.
And don't forget about the archdevil Venger. I still can't decide how to set up his stat block, and whether or not he should have a lair, mythic actions, and so on. Also, should he just have every spell in the PHB, or just a selected list.
Orange Juice!
Depends what you're after. As others have suggested, having a powerful NPC follow the party around would be weird and can backfire quickly. However, if you're just trying to get more in-character interaction with the party, how about giving them a Sentient Weapon or other artefact with the ability to talk. It can contain whatever 'character' your DM NPC would be, and allows you to interact with the party in-character, but can't easily be killed or actively interfere.
This is a great idea. I once gave a minor magic weapon to a fighter in random loot. It wasn't that special, but it looked cool. The party finished their quest, but then spent about a year in real life developing a story about the sword. I wrote almost nothing myself. There were a few visions given to the fighter to direct them, but they ran with it and had a great time. If I really needed to get them back on track (to their own plot line), I would just send a vision. They had a great time, and it did half my job.