Is a combat only DMPC a red flag?

[magicalmagicman]

Everywhere I've read DMPCs are a red flag. But seeing how it's really hard to find a high-op table, I want to DM one, but only if I can stick my PC into the fray too. Is adding a DMPC who does nothing out of combat other than act like the strong silent type a red flag?

[Mike Miller]

It sounds like a red flag. It doesn't have to be one, but it sounds like one. It depends on the party somewhat. If you have two players, for example, the third "DM"PC could help round out the party. If you have 5 players, the "DM"PC would drag things down.

Instead of having your own DMPC, just enjoy playing the high-op NPCs?

[DeTess]

Everywhere I've read DMPCs are a red flag. But seeing how it's really hard to find a high-op table, I want to DM one, but only if I can stick my PC into the fray too. Is adding a DMPC who does nothing out of combat other than act like the strong silent type a red flag?

I think this really depends on the table and on you as DM. You're including this DMPC to basically show off your optimization prowess which basically introduces a conflict of interest, as you both ant your DMPC to shine, but the other players should get their share of spotlight as well. It'd be easy to include encounters particularly suited to your PC, even intentionally, because you'd think it'd make for a cool scene.

Its not impossible to run well, but I'd talk about this with your players in advance, and if they complain later, you should be ready to just cut out the DMPC.

[Biggus]

I think Mike has it right, in a small party a DMPC can be an asset, in a large one it's probably going to be a pain, unless there's one of the key party roles nobody wants to fill that it could fit in to.

[magicalmagicman]

If the other party members aren't as optimized as my DMPC then they wouldn't be in the game. So in this scenario it's gonna be a 4 PC party, all four equally optimized and one of them is a DMPC.

[BWR]

Note that what works for your table may be different than what works for mine, but in general you should realize that the PCs are stars of the show, not whatever you come up with. Don't add DMPCs because you want to play. Add them if they are good for the plot, or if the players/PCs need an extra body.

I've seen successful DMPCs in several games, on both sides of the screen, and common to all was that they either helped out when we needed a little something extra, or because they were enjoyable characters to interact with, usually both. They should never outshine PCs or steal the spotlight. If the players don't care about combat and are fine with something else doing all the work, you should probably tone down or eliminate combat altogether rather than play against yourself. If the players do like combat, tailor the encounters you make to their level, don't make things too hard then solve the problem for them.

[MisterKaws]

Usually you never want a DMPC to take the spotlight, so my personal recommendation would be to make a supportive character, either a pure buffer or a crowd-controller, and stay away from show-stopper options, like save-or-dies, ubercharging, scry-and-die, and all of the other cheese that should be reserved to the players.

You could also make a "Brock" sort of character. Remember how, in Pokemon, every single time they find something new, Brock just starts going wikipedia about it? That's a nice sort of sidekick, especially when you want to give your world some extra exposition.

[Malphegor]

Depends on the makeup of the party. Sometimes there is a particular niche that isn’t being filled that is normally, so it’s handy to throw at the party a knight errant or a wandering cleric who will assist the group for a while whilst going the same way in exchange for a small tithe to their church or order.

I’d probably suggest they shouldn’t take the limelight too much. Dm’s game, but the pcs’ story in a way, kinda. Or not. I dunno.


Maybe consider having the questgiver travel with the party if you need to tie it to the plot and have a long term npc with the party.

[GreatWyrmGold]

The only good DMPCs I've seen have been support. Healers, utility arcanists, a rogue, people to fill gaps in the party or guarantee they have some spell/knowledge critical for the party to move forward or something. My first D&D game had a DMPC who was there to point out things us brand-new gamers should try (watch out for traps, try talking to enemies, that kind of thing).

The first question you should be asking before adding the DMPC is "What will this character give the players?" If that's not your first question, you probably shouldn't add a DMPC to the party.

[Malroth]

If it's a primarily political campaign centered around Intrigue and Diplomacy, having an optimized combat brute NPC under the PC's employ is fine. The PCs are calling the important shots of what happens in the main story and the out of context problem of random monsters interupting the ball are quickly and nonchallantly taken care of by the NPC. If it is a classic dungeon crawling combat heavy campaign, then the DMPC is probably a bad sign.

[SirNibbles]

I think Mike has it right, in a small party a DMPC can be an asset, in a large one it's probably going to be a pain, unless there's one of the key party roles nobody wants to fill that it could fit in to.

We had a healmonkey DMPC in one of our campaigns. It was literally a monkey that would heal us occasionally since we didn't have a healer. It was a good addition to the party, though he couldn't really do much outside of that because he was a monkey, which worked out well.

[frogglesmash]

DMPCs are red flag, but it's important to note that while bad DMs will have red flags, red flags don't necessarily make you a bad DM.

Edit: There's also a difference between DMPC, and an NPC that accompanies the party.

[Inchhighguy]

A DMPC is always a red flag. Nine times out of ten it does not exactly work out. And the time it works out is very rare with lots of special things happening.

When I DM, I never do it.....I only use ''normal" NPCs.

[Falontani]

I generally create the player's cohorts for them if they get one.
I had a rogue like character, who's entire shtick was that he was afraid of being seen due to a powerful entity in his backstory. Around level 8 most pcs and any npc that wasn't reasonably endowed with spot/listen couldn't find the character. By level 14 he was just about immune to all but mindsight.
So I gave him an npc wizard. One that was loyal to a T, but generally didn't think before acting. I gave this player this npc, because it allowed him to slowly learn the magic system (he had ranks in umd, but never touched scrolls out wands. Because the player hardly talked in character since the party only could guess in character whether he was around or not. And because in combat he was only just barely not useless. I let him role play the npc and play her in combat.

[ekarney]

Look there is a lot of stigma around DMPCs and a lot of it is at least partially justified (Namely due to amateur DMs wanting to show off)
Also no matter which way you phrase it it comes back to DMPC whether it's a DMPC, NPC, permanent mercenary retainer or whatever.

That being said, the title does hold a far more significant impact when you actually bring it to the table.
My advice would be, have the "DMPC"in question become a retainer for the party. Have the costs be previously be covered by some favor the PC's did for a warlord or whatever, and as a result the warlord sends a lower-ranking mercenary to help keep the PCs safe.
What you need to watch out for isn't whether or not it's a DMPC but rather how you RP it. Having a strong silent type show up one day and outshine the players simply will not work. Having a mercenary however, show up and follow the PCs orders (To a reasonable extent), before every battle have the DMPC ask "What's the battle plan? What should I do to help you?" and then follow that to the letter.

Even better, RP the character out of combat, and have a player control the DMPC is combat, that is provided a player wants to manage to characters in combat.

[Vaern]

The extent of my experience with DMPCs is limited to NPCs that my group has insisted on having accompany our party because they were generally likable characters to keep in the game, the most notable being a paladin who accompanied the party through about a third to half of a campaign that ran from level 1 to level 15.
The primary purpose of a DMPC, should you push the character into the players' party, should be to drive the plot forward. A DMPC that does not serve that purpose is not inherently bad, as it's easy to understand that the DM may occasionally get tired of storytelling and want to take part in the other side of the game once in a while, but you must be careful not to take too much of that side of the game away from your players.
The DM gets the opportunity to express their creativity through the creation of their world and the stories they tell through it. The enjoyment of being a player is playing the lead role in those stories and having the spotlight shine on you in the situation you've built your character for. If your character is geared strictly towards combat then you should at least try to make your character somewhat less effective at it than your players' characters and, in doing so, see to it that you don't steal their thunder.

[GreatWyrmGold]

A DMPC is always a red flag. Nine times out of ten it does not exactly work out. And the time it works out is very rare with lots of special things happening.

When I DM, I never do it.....I only use ''normal" NPCs.
I just realized that there might be a definitional issue with this question. So to clarify: When I say "DMPC," I use that term to include any character who travels with the party on a long-term basis (aside from PC's class features, animated minions, etc).



That being said, the title does hold a far more significant impact when you actually bring it to the table.
My advice would be, have the "DMPC"in question become a retainer for the party. Have the costs be previously be covered by some favor the PC's did for a warlord or whatever, and as a result the warlord sends a lower-ranking mercenary to help keep the PCs safe.
What you need to watch out for isn't whether or not it's a DMPC but rather how you RP it. Having a strong silent type show up one day and outshine the players simply will not work. Having a mercenary however, show up and follow the PCs orders (To a reasonable extent), before every battle have the DMPC ask "What's the battle plan? What should I do to help you?" and then follow that to the letter.
I'd have to disagree. My personal gold standard for DMPCs is Harry the wizard. He showed up with a dagger that belonged to a former PC named Tom (the DM skipped Richard), displayed an unnerving obsession to one of the PCs (though he obviously kept it to player-comfort levels), and would ignore any PC orders that he thought could put him in danger. He was mostly a utility spellcaster and occasional plot catalyst (like helping us gather money or put together what our knowledge checks couldn't or have a connection to someone's backstory), with a side gig as backup straight-man to our party's lunacy.
I'm getting off-track. Why a DMPC never takes the spotlight from the players is far less important than that they never take that spotlight. Harry was a coward who creeped a couple of characters out, but he never left his supporting role, so he was a good DMPC.

...Though yes, a retainer or employee or whatever is absolutely the easiest way to make sure your DMPC doesn't take the spotlight.

[Gnaeus]

I think DMPCs are almost always problematic. They talked about spotlight time, which was important. Someone else mentioned creating encounters that play to the strengths of your characters, which seems even worse to me.

The best combat DMPC is taking away time from you in combat, when you are already playing the entire opposite side. Rather than thinking “what is my monster going to do, you have to think about what your character is going to do. I was in one fight where the PCs were all dropped and the last 10 minutes + was watching the DM roll dice against himself to see if we died.

And that’s best case. That’s without concerns of using OOC information. Or bias in terms of who whe monster attacks. Or dropping loot that benefits your character. Or fudging dice rolls to keep your character alive or make them awesome. Or any of a hundred other little rules calls a Dm makes in combat. And even if you don’t cheat, the impression that you are cheating is equally destructive. If you went to a sports ball game and the referee was suited up as a member of one of the teams, no one would expect a fair game. That’s what you are doing.

[Red Fel]

The problem of a combat-oriented DMPC (or permanent NPC, or what-have-you) is, as stated, the conflict of interest. The conflict can be summed up as follows:

Either you're doing it right, in which case, the PCs are just along for the ride, or you're doing it wrong, in which case you're making things worse for the party.

Let me explain. Let's say your DMPC is a spellcaster. You - as DM - know all of the obstacles your party will face that day. But if you - as character - prepare all the spells necessary to overcome those obstacles, you're a show-off. There's no reason to even have those obstacles there, except to let your character showboat.

But suppose you - as character - don't prepare all those spells. Well, now you have a conflict. Because your party knows that you - as DM - knew about those obstacles, and didn't prepare the spells to overcome them. So you basically screwed the party over with your lack of preparation.

If that sounds like an unfair double-standard... Well, it is. That's the risk you take as a GM dipping a toe into the PC pool. It's easy when you're in an opposed position to the PCs. But as soon as you're playing both sides, that's where it gets messy.

Similarly, let's look at your combat monkey. If he's trained for disarm or trip maneuvers against flying enemies with natural weapons, he's useless dead weight. If he's trained to engage in single combat with a single enemy while the party deals with the rest, you could remove him and reduce the number of enemies in an encounter by one and see no change whatsoever in gameplay. If he's trained to just dominate in combat, then basically fight scenes are your DMPC's showcase, and a time for the players to grab another soda and slice of pizza and wait until you finish playing with yourself.

The entendre was intentional.

There's also the problem of lethality. If your DMPC can't or won't be killed in any scene, he basically becomes the party's plot armor. They'll send him in to solo major bosses knowing he can't lose. Even if he doesn't win, he can come back and tell them exactly what to expect. Why check for traps? Just send the plot armored DMPC stumbling blindly down the hall to trigger everything. And if you catch wise, and he manages to evade all the traps? Well, now you're just a dirty cheater.

The point is that it's very hard to create a situation in which a DMPC is (1) not mandatory, (2) not unstoppable, and (3) not useless. If your DMPC is any of these things - mandatory, unstoppable, or useless - he's a bad egg and you're going to run into problems. It's why the most common roles for DMPCs, when they're used at all, are healers and force multipliers, rather than direct actors.

[weckar]

Let's not forget the other great use for (temporary) DMPCs: Traitors! :smallbiggrin:

[Ken Murikumo]

I use combat focused DMPCs somewhat often, as of recently, as my group has dwindled to 2/3 players. I use them to bolster the party in combat and give the enemies another target. I usually just make them a fighter because it's easy and i will never outshine anyone at anything. Depending on the skill of the party, i sometimes even make them a level lower than the party.

If the party needs spellcasters, i usually pair them with a regular NPC until the plot no longer needs them and they part ways.

In short give them a decent personality and make them play second fiddle to the party. As long as they dont drag the party down, get in the way, or outshine the players, it should be fine.

[Thunder999]

It really depends, in one game I'm playing the GM brings out one of a few GMPCs who don't do any RP (he lets us pick which) when we've got people missing (group of 5+GM, if two people miss we bring out the GMPC rather than stop playing), they're all reasonably well build, but not especially spotlight stealing. It's nice, means we're not suddenly stuck burning spells to open doors and find traps just because the rogue player wasn't feeling well, or struggling in combat because noone with a melee build turned up.