Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 Barky Feb 14, 2015 17:55:56	I've had a hard time awarding inspiration per the PHB. I have a mental block on the whole process: it feels heavy; and it's hard to get the players to play their PCs per their traits, and  it's hard for me to spot when they do & award it "right".     I do have a house rule that says "if I find a player's actions amazingly smart, unique, or laugh-out-loud funny, they get Inspiration". I do that just to keep the game interesting. But the official inspiration rules, I wrestle with them terribly.   Do you use inspiration in your game? By the book or home-ruled?    Do you continually modify bonds & stuff as the campaign goes on? Do you let players choose them and change them when they want?   I feel I'm running this part of the game horribly, and need advise.
#2 DM_HEEGZ Feb 14, 2015 18:30:51	I DM primarily teenagers and they are all new to D&D. They did not roleplay very much at all. So I started giving out inspiration very liberally, for almost any type of role play. Then the others started roleplaying ot get their own inspiration die reward. Now they all roleplay without exception, and compete with each other for that inspiration die. I have been able to relax it back to a more normal rate. I use it as a tool to reward players for roleplaying their characters. The less roleplay going on, the more I award it. If there is a lot of roleplay I give it out more sparingly. It has literally changed my gaming group dynamics.
#3 Devils-Advocate Feb 14, 2015 18:46:50	DM_HEEGZ wrote:
#4 Archon007 Feb 14, 2015 20:13:10	I house ruled what they can do with Insperation, but award it as written. For roleplay, playing up a bond or flaw, or doing something interesting or heroic. I use poker chips so that gives me a visual and reminder to pass them out.    My house rule is a player can accumulate a maximum of 3, and...   Using Inspiration A player can spend an Inspiration point whenever he or she makes an attack roll, saving throw (including Death Save), or ability check gaining one of the following benefits: Advantage: before rolling you can spend an inspiration point to gain advantage on your roll. Heroic Effort: after rolling, but before the outcome of the roll is determined, you can spend an inspiration point to roll a d6 and add it to the d20, possibly turning a failed roll into a success. A player can only spend 1 inspiration point per d20 roll.
#5 pukunui Feb 14, 2015 20:29:52	I have six players in one of my games. I struggle to remember all their characters' personality traits, let alone keep track of who's roleplaying them well enough to earn inspiration - even though I've got them written down on little tent cards. I've told the players that they need to call out when they think someone has done something worthy of inspiration; otherwise, I will use it more like a compel in FATE - that is, "I'll give you inspiration if you accept this complication related to one of your traits ...". Seems to work out OK.
#6 Azylynne Feb 15, 2015 1:11:59	For my main group, most of my players play some sort of really flawed character, either because of their traits and flaws, or they have extremely low stats (5, now 6 for Int for one character, 5 Charsima for another), or just because... they love played flawed characters period without really impeding or becoming disruptive to the rest of the group.  Most of us have been gaming together for years, so we have an understanding on how our characters interact with each other and none take it personally as a player.  There are times when a player, when slighted, would totally laugh and applaud the other player, even though their characters are at odds with one another. For that, the Inspiration flows... whether be for flaws from the background, flaws from the character itself or in following their own ambitions, or flaws due to low attribute scores.  The Int 5 (now 6) Paladin has made for a lot of humorous and extremely funny situations even though he is the 'face" person of the group since he has the highested Charisma score.  I also give out Inspiration for amazing feats from the characters (like multiple crits) or doing something that was outstanding in one form or another.  I am okay with handing them out as it creates for amazing heroic moments when they may need a re-roll here or there.  They often will save it for a critical moment too as opposed to just blowing through them just because. For my other group I run for, I give out Inspiration for roleplaying.  We have several new players, and in that, I'll give them boons for roleplaying their characters whether to the detriment or benefit of the party.  I'll also give out inspiration for the various variant rules in the DMG, like the Cleric meditating and gaining the favor of Helm, or something else whenever I see fit (the cleric was not trying to milk the system, he just didn't know what to do during down time in town). Overall, I have fun with it, and give it out liberally for both groups.  It helps keep the mood light as often Inspiration reflects for humorous moments in the game, evne if the characters are sorta suffering for it.
#7 pukunui Feb 15, 2015 4:13:38	Here's a question: How many people stick to the limit of one at a time for Inspiration, and how many treat it more like points, allowing PCs to accrue multiple instances of Inspiration?
#8 Barky Feb 15, 2015 4:39:11	pukunui wrote:
#9 Azylynne Feb 15, 2015 7:32:44	pukunui wrote:
#10 iserith Feb 15, 2015 7:38:17	The way I do Inspiration is to have players "claim" it by opting to take disadvantage on a check due to a trait, ideal, bond or flaw or otherwise place him or herself in a position that creates a setback or cost based on the same. So if a character has a flaw of "I'm suspcious of strangers and I expect the worst of them," the player can opt to make a Charisma (Persuasion) roll I call for at disadvantage when dealing with an NPC. In the doing, he or she accrues Inspiration. This method allows me to not worry about it and puts it in the control of the players. I limit Inspiration to having it or not as per the rules.
#11 Barky Feb 15, 2015 8:04:15	iserith wrote:
#12 Archon007 Feb 15, 2015 10:34:16	pukunui wrote:
#13 DM_HEEGZ Feb 15, 2015 12:43:50	Only one inspiration at a time. I award by passing the player a spare d20 of a unique color.
#14 pukunui Feb 15, 2015 13:42:27	To be honest, I've actually been using Plot Twist Cards in place of the default Inspiration mechanic. Still only one at a time, though. And as I mentioned above, I've mostly only been offering them as compels to get the players to roleplay their negative personality traits. That being said, I've been finding that most cards I hand out end up getting turned back in at the end of the session unused, so I've decided to let them spend a card to get the default Inspiration mechanic benefit of advantage on a roll - hopefully the cards won't go to waste as much that way, and they may even end up getting more than one a session.
#15 Rhenny Feb 15, 2015 15:08:05	I still limit them to 1 each.  I'm kind of striving for players to spend 'em and earn 'em fluidly and quickly to keep the game moving fast and furious.     I've been playing a little Edge of the Empire (Star Wars) lately, and I really like the way they use light side/dark side points.   The whole use of them becomes a pool that anyone can draw upon.  If the players draw, they use a light side point and it converts to a dark side point.   The DM can draw from the dark side points.   That system encourages a transaction between players gaining benefits and DM/monster side gaining benefits.   I wonder if that could be done in D&D?
#16 Ranthalan Feb 16, 2015 21:21:54	No more than 1 at a time and it expires at the end of the session.  I give them out for anything I want to encourage.  Contributed to the campaign wiki? Have some inspiration.  I also don't allow the players to transfer inspiration to other player as per rules.  If I think a player deserves it, I'll award it to them myself.  I have large 34mm d20s I hand out for it.
#17 Kayal Feb 17, 2015 10:09:50	I limit them to one a time. And I still award it based on what they have listed as traits, bonds, ideals, and flaws. Also, I don't even try to remember all their traits, bonds, ideals, and flaws, though; I typed up a list, which I keep next to me when I'm running the game.
#18 Goon-for-Hire Feb 17, 2015 11:01:16	I try to give it as often as possible.  Whether they are focusing on their character traits, or just role-playing really well.  The big goal of the DM is to make sure everyone has fun, and with the folks at my table, they all are the happiest when everyone is in character and deeply immersed.  I look for excuses to give them back inspiration as quickly as I can after they spend it.  It is easier for them to do if they also are playing with a little heroic / swashbuckling flare, which is so much easier to do if they spend inspiration.  It quickly becomes a feedback loop - smart play leads to  exciting heroics leads to deep-immersion role-play leads to more smart play.   Early on my players had a hard tiem remembering about inspiration, most of them have been playing since Basic or AD&D 1e, getting the new mechanic down has been slow, so I started using tokens to remind them.  First bottle caps, then toys, then glass beads, now I am hoping to get down to the dollar store and pick up some toy pirate doubloons to do it, because the act of handing out shiny treasure might also improve their immersion. I hand them to the players when they earn inspiration, and have them give them back when they spend it.
(Reply to #18) JohnLynch	Roleplaying a flaw for inspiration can become quite disruptive so I've avoided doing that.   To be honest I didn't like the mechanic to begin with and I had a group that seemed to gel with each other pretty well. We've gotten a new player now who isn't gelling as well with everyone else so I'm looking to start awarding it to try to bring him into the larger group rather than stand off doing his own thing. I'm not sure how to best do that yet though. I'm thinking of rewarding it for finding interesting ways to help the group with out of the box thinking. We've had a couple of times where that came up and resulted in a lot more fun for everyone (and a couple of times where it didn't work exactly as intended). Rewarding inspiration (regardless of whether the idea works or not) sounds like a good way to encourage it and get other people congratulating the player for their clever thinking (especially when the player can pass the inspiration die around to others). My purple die have taken on something of a legendary status right now so I could have one of them be "the inspiration die" so it's clear who has inspiration and who doesn't.   pukunui wrote: