The guy I'm talking to asked if I wanted to play a duet game with him, needless to say I think he's super into me (this isn't a joke. He showed me this channel. I'm freaking out rn I didn't realize how much work he was putting into this)

I’ve run a game for my wife and while it was an INCREDIBLE experience that absolutely brought us closer together, I found it EXHAUSTING to run. As a DM, I rely on my players interacting with each other to give me a second to take a breath and collect my thoughts. When it’s a matter of constant interaction, there’s never a moment where I can pause

My very first session when a buddy of mine was introducing me to the game was one-on-one.
The city guards were after me, resulting in a spontaneous rooftop chase where I then swung off the roof and into the second story of a tavern (the classic running though an occupied bedroom trope). The chase continued inside the tavern with now guards on the roof and guards coming in the first floor coming up.

Now that I am a DM, I realize there was no way that sequence would have worked with a full party- at least not to the pace we had it going!

The pure character development of initially being disgusted by your own acronym to becoming proud of it, it's beautiful.

I played a full L5 to L20 campaign run by a friend of mine, and it was an amazing experience. She ran it functionally like the Baldur's Gate games: Anyone who joined my character, I controlled in battle, and she controlled in roleplay. It was so fulfilling and so much fun.

As a note on sidekicks, the sidekick doesn't have to go along with the player/party. The barkeep was one in my campaign!
I began session 1 with a specific player-character in a tavern with the barkeep, Brianne, who was practically their guardian growing up, as they had very little memory of their past. As the campaign continued and the adventurers would come back after a quest or journey, Brianne was always their go-to, a confidant, and a person who had their back even when the world seemed to turn against them. The two of them had a sending stone "thermos", essentially a lidded flask that could send each night's leftovers of the player character's favorite soup from the tavern (or, in one case, a secret letter) back and forth, and it served as a reminder every time they felt their thermos fill and warm up that they had someone they could lean on for support. It also was a super special and player-concerning plot hook when they expected soup to fill their thermos one day but it didn't come. Extremely memorable NPC and magic item combination.

@8:48 This joke is 100% real though. I've run something like 8 separate duet adventures that included romance, with 4 different players, and they've loved it.

With it being February, a lot of D&Dtube creators are making videos about how to do romance in D&D without it feeling awkward. Not having an audience does almost all the work, in my experience (even between two straight dudes).

My Spouse and I take turns switching who DM's every week, we both play three characters. It would be very hard for me to play DnD with multiple people ever again, we never miss games, we can get into long detailed down time actions, we can develop relationships. It's literally the best.

I simply love the dynamic between you two! You make such a great couple.

You really cracked me up with your acronym 😂

Really like the tip about having the PC "not die" but having the consequences be that their sidekick is imperiled.  That definitely raises the stakes.  Could even imagine the Raven Queen spawning the PC to another location and now you've got a quest for the PC to find/save the sidekick

Id love to see you make a video on solo RPGs

The best campaign I ever played was in a gmless game called Ironsworn that me and my friend played co-op. It was incredible, we both contributed cool ideas to the plot, both had our epic moments, and never knew where the story would head next. Plus I don't think we ever missed a single session unless the other was out of town. It was incredible

I will often do single player sessions with each one of my players in the party every arc or so in order to give everyone personal time to help develop the story and give cool lore for them to share when they get back with the rest of the party. I think this is a lot better than time skips because it allows each player to have the chance to have a more deep connection with the world than just something that’s very hand wavy and one piece like.

One of the funniest videos I’ve seen from you guys. Loved it!

I just paused a video after 10:01 to leave a like. It gets me when ppl just do not afraid to look silly. (= It is so adorable!

One of my best friends and I have been playing a duet game together where we both play a PC and both GM our way through modules together, it's been a blast to just sorta work together and play to see what the Module has to offer and have fun playing off each other in roleplay scenes

As an OSR DM I see myself as someone who runs a world, not tell stories. If I can create a world that is rich and full of mystery and then sit back and run it, my players will create a story by interacting with it. This can facilitate stories, and will if you do it right. But I never see my ‘job’ as creating a story and wowing my players with it.

This is also a great way to try new systems. Our main DM and I ran some Mothership d and Blades in the Dark sessions for each other, which we then expanded to the rest of the group later. Genuinely had so much fun trying them out, and there was so much room to play around and try stuff

Im only halfway through the video, but when you mentioned the no dying rule due to the relationship with the raven queen it reminded me of the ttrpg fabula ultima and how the players don't die when they hit 0 HP UNLESS they choose to sacrifice themselves.

It made me realize fabula ultima could work really well if altered slightly to make duet sessions work well.