So you asked me what I thought and at the time I gave you a fluff answer cause I wanted to consider first what I actually wanted to say about the session before telling you what I actually thought. I had a couple of comments, a few based on group/D&D and a few based on how I felt personally as a player. First, I checked out the stuff on traps, technically when the group hears they stepped on something and it clicked there is a reaction everyone rolls a DEX roll to see if their damage is halved based on the save DC, and players like rogues have abilities like dodge that automatically halves the damage, if they combine the DEX save+dodge they take no damage on success and most traps have a save DC, infact almost all AOE based attacks in D&D have an automatic save DC. So in the future I would describe the trap first, and then roll damage.(edited)
As a DM unless you're giving the players DM information its a bad idea to interject any OOC (out of character) comments during P2P (player 2 player) RP, essentially you're either a DM or a player you can't be both. Preparation is key, I know you haven't used roll20 and neither have I as a DM, I also know you were having difficulties with the map stuff from now on if you need krystal or myself to come in and make sure everything's working as intended do that, there's plenty of time. In the two weeks we had that stuff should have been done like how Q told us all to gather so he could make sure his stream was working properly. Essentially the more you have prepared before hand; everything from understanding of rules, creature index cards, player index cards, lore/store pages, etc, the better and faster everything will be. I also recommend instead of asking questions to the players like "whats your AC" it should be something more like "Does an 18 hit?" "Yes" "Ok you take 5 damage" it should also be the same from the players side "Does a 21 hit?" "Yes" "Ok the creature takes 12 damage" ETC.
Now as a player, I would say it applies to all players in general. At the mansion when the NPC asked me and my sister to wait in the other room and I made my exist, you attempted to make my character look dumb I didn't feel like that was kosher, I'm not saying that's what you did, that's just how it came off to me. My character is the most stealthiest character in the game because that's how I built him, a DEX of 20 +5 MOD, a cloak that gives me advantage and gives enemies disadvantage on perception checks, it changes color to match my surroundings like cammo and boots that make no sound. It doesn't matter if the guy was a magical mage, or if his house was enchanted because a DM is there to serve the players not the other way around. It wasn't combat, it was RP flare, it was flavor text, it was the way my character chose to make his exit. You could have said something like "I can't see you, but I can still feel your presence for this house is enchanted." And it logically makes sense because you -would- have to role a perception check no matter who your NPC is, and you'd have to take the lower of the two rolls because of my cloak. D&D is all about checks and rules, you cant bend or break them but the most important thing is that a good DM is there to SERVE the players if the players aren't having fun there's no point. Every good DM asks each player what they expect/want out of a game before they start and I want to play my rogue the way they are meant to be played, stealthy, in the shadows, as a shadow. There are 4 things I want, the kings arc, my mothers arc/story, to be a stealthy as fuck rogue, and the only important NPC in my story Himawari, that's pretty much it, besides w/e you have planned with the breach and the martial tattoos.
The next thing is combat, no matter how beefed up your hyenas were they wouldn't have detected my rogue without a NAT20. Meaning I had a roll of 29 they would have had to have a 30. Now if that was the case fine, but consider that most monsters in D&D have EXTREMELY low wisdom because? THEY're monsters, wisdom and intelligence aren't just STATS they literally determine how smart, wise, perceptive, your character is how good their memory is. Do not forget about my cloak, in other words you would have had to take the LOWER of your two rolls unless you rolled 2x NAT20's I didn't say anything at the time because I knew you wanted to start the engagement but I was going to start it for you any way by assassinating one of those guards.
As for the target I was fighting, I want you to consider this, double dice damage CRIT. I hit that guy for 16 (1d8 rapiers x2) + 5 (My Dex MOD) + 12 (1d6 sneak attack x2) + 10 (2nd attack) Total of 16+5+12+10 = 43 points of damage, then I hit him for 5, and a 6, and then I missed and missed until greg finally killed him so 64 points of damage total. Why am I explaining all this math? Because the second target took 11 dmg from steph and then 18 dmg from your friend and instantly died. NO. I don't know what you're trying to do, make my character run, show that john can heal, or some point you're trying to prove. The only thing it proves to me is you wanted to speed it up cause the fight was taking too long, in which case the better thing to do would have been was to let me assassinate/kill the target that was caught by a surprise full crit double+sneak attack. I mean at our level with that much damage on one strike, being a shitty trash mob guard? I practically lobbed the guys head off, you could have just said that guy got murdered and THEN have the second target that was by the door fight it out completely to his last health POINT. Hell you could have even made the guy GIVE up, or run for it with a dart in his eye once he saw all his pals/pets were dead, to create more RP and let us gather more information after we caught him. Instead it was just a poor showing, and you cant even deny that because everyone voiced their concerns about it.
n short, be as prepared as you can be, if you're going to be a DM, be a DM don't try to be one of the players and break their immersion, you're there for the players so they can enjoy the game and have fun playing their character not to look or feel stupid unless they make a bad roll, so let them RP their flavor text and flare, if my rogue is constantly vanishing leaving a wisp of wind smoke/wind behind that's just how he enters and exists, if anyone EVEN a player challenges that make them roll perception against me, don't transition on to the next phase stupidly and illogically because you want to speed things along, don't ever, ever make up rolls unless its absolutely necessary, know the CORE rules like the back of your hand, I know a DM has to look up more complicated rules and spell DC math and what stat a wizard uses to calculate that, but core rules should be known. In any case, a lot of what I said also depends on the player knowing their equipment/character/class like the back of their hand too but with people like steph and greg I understand krystal and myself have to take care of them and be more lax about it, in any case that's my entire evaluation hopefully you're not offended by anything I said. Take what I said how you want to, but I've put a stupid amount of effort in to this D&D game, from the story I wrote, to the character sheets, I didn't just build mine, I had to build stephs, and gregs, and teach them how to use roll 20 and basically their classes along with Krystal, chose their spell slots. Everything I did from finding pictures for myself, steph, to creating those tokens, its work, its effort and I'm not gonna sit here and pretend I didn't feel this way.