Being the Dungeon Master for an official Dungeons & Dragons actual play series comes with plenty of pressure. Being the DM tasked with reintroducing Ravenloft and one of D&D's most iconic villains to a new generation of players is another challenge entirely.
Polygon had the chance to catch up with Jasmine Bhullar on the heels of the emotional Dungeon Masters season finale. She shared insights on working on the show, advice for DMs, and even confirmed that she will come back for the next campaign, which begins next week and will move to a brand-new Domain of Dread: Innsmouth. There, the players will face the mighty Cthulhu, H.P. Lovecraft's beloved eldritch horror.
This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.
Polygon: What were the biggest challenges that came with being the DM for Dungeon Masters? How did you prepare for them?
Jasmine Bhullar: I think the biggest challenge with DMing a project like Dungeon Masters is balancing the fun of D&D with trying to do justice to and portray the lore of the setting and the rules of the game faithfully. When this project was first presented to me, what was particularly appealing to me was the idea of making a show that would grow the hobby and potentially teach newcomers how to play. Sometimes, when you're in the thick of an episode, however, rules get missed or slipped up, and I've always been a little hard on myself when that happens. In terms of preparation, I tried to take some time to really understand the players' characters and backstories. I knew we only had so many episodes to not only introduce Soth and Sithicus but also give these characters important moments of their own, and I tried my best to do homework on both so I could understand the best way to incorporate everything into the story.
Did you have to adapt your DM style to accommodate the short length of the episodes?
I didn't have to adapt my style a lot to accommodate the short episode length, believe it or not. Even in my home games, I favor shorter play sessions, and I do a lot of unedited stuff on-stage, so doing something more succinct is always a challenge I want to take on.
The characters’ backstories emerge organically during the show, despite the short episodes. How did you make that happen? Did you work with the players on their backgrounds?
I took some time to talk to each of the players about their characters, and then I used that information to figure out where to put pressure so I could get each one to start to crack (Ravenloft being a horror setting lends itself to this tactic). From there, I would let the party dig their own graves, especially when there was in-fighting and turmoil among the party members. I tried to interrupt it as little as I could to just let that pressure cooker kind of build. I think it really helped turn up the dial on the "we need to find a way out of here!" desperation I wanted to tap into for Ravenloft.
Image: Wizards of the Coast
You had a mix of veterans and new players at the table. How do you navigate that as a DM?
I like having a mix of new and veteran players. Introducing an iconic villain like Strahd will make veterans of the game gasp while a new player looks around the table excited, sort of trying to figure out why this is a big deal. Conversely, there are some monsters that veteran players have seen a dozen times and are less impressed by, but a new player's surprise and delight just fuels encounters that might otherwise be mundane for a table full of veterans. That feeling of joy and excitement is contagious, and all the players feed off of each other.
In the final episode, there is a moment where Neil’s character, Professor Crem, misses a decisive spell attack against Lord Soth. You allowed him to reroll by bending the rules for Heroic Inspiration a bit. I think that was a moment where you had to decide how the campaign would end, in tragedy or triumph, and you chose the latter. Can you explain that decision, and also tell a little about how you feel about the DM intervening to change the course of the story?
Well, it's kind of funny. The rules for Heroic Inspiration and things like the Lucky feat vary from 5e to 5.5e, and I mix them up just like any other player or DM. When and where and how to implement the rules is a balancing act I take very seriously. I'm sure I don't nail it every time, but I also take cues from my players. I don't ever hand players victory, but there are times I will thumb the scale just a hair when they've fought for something so hard. Professor Crem is interesting because at that moment, I didn't feel like he was heroic. I felt like he was desperate and beaten down and tired. He'd lost his career. He'd lost his wife. He was going to lose his daughter. Sometimes that kind of cornered desperation makes us capable of things that are out of the ordinary. His wasn't a "heroic" inspiration in my mind. It was an "I can't lose anything else." inspiration.
What is your favorite moment in the first campaign of Dungeon Masters?
I think my favorite moment in the first campaign was the first time the party had proper downtime in the windmill. There were so many things happening during that first long rest: it felt like a mixture of wholesome and heartbreaking, but there was also a kind of tension that set the tone for the rest of the campaign.
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What is the most important advice you have for new DMs?
The most important advice I have for new DMs is to PLAY. Yes, you shape the world and design the encounters and guide the story, but you are also a PLAYER. The second you lose that joy of playing, you sort of lose your craft. I've never felt like a forever DM. I think it's because it's my favorite seat to sit in. It always feels like playing. I never get tired of doing it. I'm actually DMing a game for my birthday. So play. Have fun. Find people that you have fun with.
You have appeared in other popular actual play shows like Critical Role and Acquisitions Incorporated. What sets Dungeon Masters apart from them?
I think Dungeon Masters feels different for me because it feels like it's "my" show. I don't know if it's conceited to say that, but it feels like my players and my table when, if I'm being honest, I'm usually brought in as a one-off or a guest on productions. I've had the privilege of guest-DMing a lot of the big shows in town, and in some pockets, I was kind of known as "the DM's DM," if that makes sense. But Dungeon Masters feels special because it's our set and our crew and our team. I have a bunch of stuff behind the DM screen that is there to accommodate how I like to DM (drawers for hiding minis and little creature comforts, for example). When I'm back there, it just feels kind of like coming home, as corny as that sounds. I've been on Acquisitions Incorporated for a while now and my character Certainty Dran definitely just lives permanently somewhere in my brain now. But that show and CR have such long and storied histories, I'm not vain enough to claim them as "mine" in any capacity.
Does that mean you'll be coming back for the next campaign of Dungeon Masters?
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Image: Dungeon Masters/Wizards of the Coast
Image: Wizards of the Coast
Image: Penny Arcade
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