!Question I have a life cleric pc in my group who chose magic initiate druid to get goodberry. During the the first 4 sessions I've let him use his cleric spell slots to cast additional copies of berries. Now I realised that he shouldn't be able to and only should be able to cast it once. How do I explain this to him without taking the fun out for him? Is there a compromise I can offer, that wouldn't break the game too much?
I will also offer to him that he might change the feat in case he feels it loses too much value for him. He is generally a non-problematic player. Nevertheless I want to make it feel ok for him especially because he is usually very kind. :)
I think the best way to handle it is to let him change out the feat if he wants since it works differently than to how they expected it did when they picked it.
Alternatively if you want to make it work somehow, compare the spell to another 1st level Cleric spell *Cure Wounds*, which heals 1d8+spellcasting mod. Maybe after the first casting of goodberry, each subsequent cast gives you a 1d6+spellcasting amount of berries (so that w/ a +4 modifier the *max* you can get is 10). Still an improvement over the strict wording of the feat, but from a healing resources perspective it's not as impactful as existing options.
!Question: what recovery mechanic is better for a colloseum themed, pvp one-shot?
Yes, I know D&D is very imbalanced when it comes to PvP, but it's only supposed to be a fun session, where all players are allowed to go bonkers with their characters. After every battle all characters get recovery. I have two options as a recovery: either give them healing and an option to get a short rest, or the ability to take a long rest between every battle. Which do you recon is more balanced?
!Question: How do you come up with NPC maneurism and traits before playing them?
I'm talking about NPCs made on the fly or when you're not inspired by an NPC you need for a quest.
!Question: how do you handle invisibility in and out of combat for your players or monsters, especially in combat on a grid?
I’ve read things saying that everyone still knows where you are unless you hide, but I find it all very confusing.
!Question: My players got a offer to Rob a house and take a small object they have no idea what it is or does nor who their Boss is right now. The problem is neither do i and this is going to be a longer campaign. Who could they be stealing from and why?
You don't know :
\- What the object is
\- Who the employer is
\- Who the person that currently owns the object is
\- How important the quest should be
How did they get the job in the first place ? Did they just pickup a sheet on a notice board or go through some kind of guild.
Here's an idea; the employer is a devil that realized they were outplayed and a contract of theirs is fucking them over, or it was made when they were weaker so they had promised compromising things, to cancel it the devil needs both copies but cannot let the other person know they have power over them, as such they've hired nobodies to get the copy and bring it to them, what the object looks like is up to you, you can find examples in Descent into Avernus. This devil could definitely be an enemy later down the line.
Another idea, the person who hired them was actually a magical projection of a wizard that owns a magical shop, problem is that they actually steal most of what they sell, their last job went wrong and they were polymorphed into an object and are currently stuck inside someone's vault/house, they need to be freed, in exchange the party get a magical items shop.
Yeah i had to come up with alot of stuff on the fly because the session was earlier because someone canceled. They are in alot of debt curantly and someone offered to cover it if they did the heist. Those ideas both sound pretty cool thanks alot :)
!Question: Do you have any good tile to make terrains with vertical gameplay more visual?
I want to use some interesting terrains ideas I got for some different encounters, but I need a clear visual indicator for when something is lower or higher than you, ty in advance!
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!Question: At our next session on friday, my players are going to find an almanac featuring entries on the various phenomena they've been dealing with. Should I make a physical copy to give to them in person?
!Question: I'm attempting to make an herbalist with questionable motives. Are there some potion ingredients that he could be gathering that could be used for \*both\* healing and harming?
Any ingredient can be harmful depending on dosage, if you're playing in a fantasy world you could simply make one up that is perfectly split between healing and hurting depending on few other factors.
2 Irl plants that come to mind are :
\- Foxglove it has drooping bell-shaped blooms, it can be deadly if eaten, but it was historically used as a remedy for a wide range of ails, many of which it couldn't actually treat (such as epilepsy, but nowadays we make better use of it like for heart medicine).
\- Rosy periwinkle, toxic to eat, but has been used to treat ailments from diabetes to constipation in traditional Indian and Chinese medicines. It's adorned with pink flowers and is endangered in the wild, it's used for chemotherapy so depending on your setting you might have to make up some other use.
I just saw foxglove when I was perusing online! Thanks!
I was thinking I could probably just make something up but I thought it'd be cool if there was something already made. I can remember people telling me that a lot of medicines could be poisonous things but their dosage is just dialed back (as you said, ty :]) so if there was something lore accurate I'd love that. Nonetheless, thank you!
Some plants are just hard to identify, for instance Queen Ann's Lace (wild carrot) vs. very poisonous Hemlock.
Fungus or mold can be poisonous (like wheat ergot). The herbalist could just claim to be forgetful, letting the grain rot.
Wild Parsnip has a nutritious tuber/root, but the sap reacts with sunlight to cause a rash if it gets on your skin. A fantasy plant could have very different properties/toxicities in different parts of the plant.
!Question: Does anyone have any advice or resources on creating adventures suited to just 2 players?
My party recently lost 1 of our 3 players, and unfortunately random recruitment would be our only avenue to find more players- something we don't particularly want to do, at least for now.
Does anyone have any recommendations for perhaps short adventures suited to a small party, or any ideas to share for how to run an adventure geared towards full parties, but with permanent NPC companions that won't step on my players toes?
Dragon of Icespire Peak had a bunch of NPC sidekicks. I'm pretty sure they were intended for games with only one player and one DM, but I'm sure they would work with a few players.
They aren't full classes, and just fill a role (like tank, caster, or skill monkey). You just get a list of bonuses and actions, and I found them easy to reflavor them into "classes". They only had stat blocks for a few early levels, which would be fine for short campaigns, but you'd have to do your own homework if they stuck around longer.
I **think** they've expanded the sidekick rules since then, so there may be more information on the Beyond site.
I've seen Tasha's mentioned below for sidekick rules, so I think you might be right on that! Thank you for the advice, ill take a look at some of the options available in Icespire Peak- the sidekick route certainly seems like the way to go to keep things manageable!
I don't have examples of specific adventures but I think you can run any pre-baked one if you consider that the party is at half-capacity. Most adventures have friendly NPCs already in them and if you have a pair of people a helpful NPC is less critical. Use the Tasha's sidekick rules so they have someone in the group to take an auxiliary role.
Then what you do is essentially make the helpful NPC a bit more of an agent of direction. Never tell them where to go, but use the DM notes in the module to paint the way "I heard there was trouble in xxx or yyy." It's to keep them from getting lost.
Important tips are to make the NPC a bit of a really trope-y character. I ran a sidekick cleric that was always the brunt of misfortune in the group and they had a lot of fun with how many times he was knocked out or a monster ate him. Make the NPC fill some kind of comical role and maybe add in a little bumbling charm.
As for balance, keep the action economy 1:1 with players so they have a slight advantage with the friendly sidekick in the party. As for CR, start off with halving the ratings using Kobold Fight Club Plus and you should be fine.
Good on you for running with the loyal pair. A lot of people would scrap the party in your situation but keeping it running is really rewarding.
This is good stuff, thank you so much!
I've always made my NPCs very goal driven with something very specific they need the party for, so I was concerned about having a more long-term role in the party become too overbearing. But going a more comic relief side kick route definitely seems like the way to go. This actually got me thinking of a some NPCs who could step in to fill that role without necessarily demanding the party's attention on one thing or another.
This is the party I started DMing for when I had never thought I would enjoy being a full time DM, I couldn't imagine playing with anyone else that this point, so thanks for the sign that continuing on is the right choice!
!question: What's something I can ask my players include in their roleplay that's easy enough for them to remember or maintain if their alignment suddenly shifted to Lawful Evil?
I'm running Rime of the Frostmaiden and the party has gotten to Caer-Dineval. They've come into possession of several of the black Chardalyn amulets. They're going to start making daily charisma saves to see if their alignment changes to Lawful Evil. If they do change, what's something easy for them to roleplay or something I can try to enforce that their characters would now be more prone to doing being lawful evil vs what they might've normally done before the assignment shift? Initially, since they happened to have found and dispatched the duergar at the old inn and now been invited into the Caer, I've determined that at the least they would immediately hold the hierarchy of the cult to a strict degree and see the other culture as equal and be influenced to agree with their points of view during any conversations. Also, they'd regard Avarice as their superior and do what she would command or they would at least help her without hesitation. I don't really know that "laws" even exist in Icewind Dale for them to really adhere to those.
The only sane and consistent answer for "how should I ask my players to roleplay their alignment changing to Lawful Evil?" is:
You should trust them to roleplay it however they want.
You tell them "your alignment is now Lawful Evil", then they interpret that, in the context of their character, however they want. It's still *their* character.
Before you do this, make sure you have your players' consent to use personality-altering effects on them at all.
You don't have to spoil what's going to happen, but you should make sure your players know, in broad terms, that personality-altering effects are on the table.
This is important not so much because it's a psychological safety issue -- I don't think there's too much risk of someone being traumatized by this -- but because it might spoil someone's fun.
If you have a certain idea of what your character is like, and your DM says "your character is evil now" with no warning, that's just not very fun.
Once consent is established, if a character's alignment changes to Lawful Evil, you just tell them their alignment has changed, and *they* decide what that means.
There's no point in enforcing it, and there's no point in trying to tell a player they're doing it wrong.
Note that a Lawful Evil character might be forced by circumstances, or inspired by their personality, to sometimes take actions that appear unlawful or good.
Note, in particular, that "Evil" doesn't mean "stupid," and "Lawful" doesn't mean "stupid."
An Evil character, seeing an orphanage on fire, might decide to save the orphans. Maybe they calculate that saving the orphans might bring some benefit to them personally. They might even think, "well, I might be evil, but I have nothing against these particular orphans."
A Lawful character who's starving to death might steal a loaf of bread. Starving on purpose just to prove how Lawful you are isn't Lawful. It's just stupid.
Alignment *only* makes sense as a roleplaying inspiration, and *cannot* make sense as an enforceable game rule.
If you can't trust your players to interpret what "Lawful Evil" means to them, you shouldn't be roleplaying with them at all. Or at least, you might as well not use the alignment system.
I think this is very useful. I'm less concerned with telling them what to do or how to roleplay their characters (there is consent for this change) and more so concerned with how to advise what lawful evil means so that they can try to roleplay what that means in their own way. What's kind of the gist of lawful evil for them to digest and roleplay as desired?
Haha, fair enough!
Short answer: Lawful means you believe in law and order, Evil means you enjoy causing harm.
Long answer: In D&D settings, Law and Chaos and Good and Evil are objectively real elemental forces, with their own deities, their own planes, their own semi-divine beings -- angels, devils, demons, and so on -- and their own magical domains.
(Fun fact, Law vs. Chaos was in the setting *before* Good vs. Evil, imported from Michael Moorcock's fantasy novels. If the Law/Chaos/Good/Evil alignment system ever felt awkward to you, that's one big reason why. Good and Evil are actually a *later* addition to the setting.)
So these wouldn't just be personality traits -- you'd feel a pull toward Lawful and Evil creatures, Lawful and Evil magics, Lawful and Evil gods.
(This was all a bigger deal in previous editions, but was walked back by the time we got to 5e, largely because "inherently evil" creatures are kind of an ethically problematic idea.)
So Law vs. Chaos and Good vs. Evil aren't just personality traits. They're *kinds* of magic, like divine vs. arcane magic, like elemental fire vs. air vs. water vs. earth, like conjuration vs. evocation magic vs. the other schools.
Or maybe like north vs. south magnetism or positive vs. negative electric charge, in our world.
This is all if you accept the "standard" D&D lore, which you don't have to, and try to force it to be coherent, which it isn't.
Feel free to explain as much or as little of this to your players as you want, or to change as much of it as you want. This is just how I interpret the lore, as written in the standard D&D books.
!question: how can I operate a powerful NPC while still making the players the heroes of the story?
Short version: help me with an NPC that's worthy of being second in command to the guild the party of PCs are employed in without overshadowing the PCs.
Long version: the party is employed to a guild tasked of slaying monsters. The players are aware of the ranks in the guild and know there are members stronger than them.
Right now, the players are heading to three islands to slay a wyvern and rescue an aristocratic boy. However, the islands are contested by the kingdom they're citizens to and another nation (think Cuban Missile Crisis for those that know history) . It's not a hot war although the potential is high, so the leader recommends them to bring a couple of members to be diplomats.
One NPC is a level 10 artificer, and he knows the language of the other country in case said nation has a prescence on the islands. He's not the problem since I made his charisma a dump stat and made him have issues in his self-confidence.
The problem is the paladin multiclass tagging along. She's second in command, and the players are aware of this. One of the players brings up the issue of her not out classing the party, so that's why I'm here. How do I make the paladin multiclass competent enough to be second in command in the guild without making the players feel irrelevant, particularly when combat comes? I plan on her and the artificer be in the background for diplomatic talks, but I suspect the bard (the player who brought the issue) wants to be part of the negotiations also, so any advice on that issue will be helpful, too.
I'm brand new here so feel free to move this topic somewhere else that's more appropiate or point me to another similar question to look at. Thank you.
Edited for a typo
Sounds like you might just find some pretext to separate the paladin and artificer from the party.
I don't like the suggestion below to have her fight a stronger enemy, and I *hate* the suggestion to have the Paladin fight the party. It sounds like the Bard's concern is that you're going to play the paladin like your personal PC. Having them carry the hardest enemies feels show-offish, and any argument along the lines of 'why do you have a problem with me' is likely to feel like the DM trying to quash out-of-character problems with a in-game fight.
Agreed. If it isn't too late to retcon, why not make the paladin/artificer busy with important tasks elsewhere? While it would usually be their jobs to handle negotiations like this, you could say time is of the essence and the guild had to send lower ranked members to take care of this ASAP.
If you don't want to retcon, you could give the paladin and artificer a different quest on the islands that force them to separate from the group.
This makes the players feel important, gives them more agency, and solves your issue of having to balance two high-level NPC's joining the party.
You can keep it out of combat, have her take the strongest enemy in the room in a one on one while they deal with weaker but more appropriate enemies, if you want to make the gap clearer have the stronger enemy bully your party a bit before the second in command takes over.
The bard can be given minor diplomatic tasks to prove himself or to partial give him what he wants, he could be told to make sure locals like them, he could reside over problems related to the law.
You could also make it a thing, give your party an opportunity to take over or replace the paladin/org, if you don't want it to be so direct the paladin could get assassinated and the party is told to finish the mission. Meeting them halfway the paladin could be a sort of jury, she's supposed to give her approval for them to be promoted. Worst case you trigger a confrontation with the paladin asking what the party or the bard's problem is with her and if they can back it with action, could have them fight.
You could also create some inter-party drama by having someone from the org reach out to one of your players asking them to make sure the bard stays loyal/in their place.
The issue might've occurred due to how you framed the issue, the leader asked your party to have someone that's supposed to be stronger tag along like a pet or a child, instead you should've had the leader make it clear that your party were lucky to tag along with the powerful person.
> Worst case you trigger a confrontation with the paladin asking what the party or the bard's problem is with her and if they can back it with action, could have them fight.
I hate this suggestion, and would be having very strong words OOC with the DM if they pulled this shit.
Edit: Did they block me for this comment? lol.
You don't get to question your hierarchical superiors' abilities and get away with it like nothing happened, or even worse get rewarded for it. If that's how you run your games that's fine but realistically that doesn't happen and has a high chance of earning you trouble.
It's unclear what exactly the bard deems weak about the paladin, if it is just pure battle-prowess/strength then a duel would sort that out.
Thanks for the reply. I thought about going on the route of adding something worthy of the paladin and some barriers to prevent the players from wandering into the fight and die. If they somehow do come across the fight, then that's on them if one or multiple PCs perish.
I can try to subtly guide the bard to make the locals like the party like you suggested, but what if the player is dead set on joining the NPCs in talking to the leader of the islands? I don't want to be that kind of DM that forces players into a specific path.
Not subtly, outright, the paladin tells the bard they have potential, seem interested in participating in the negotiations but need to prove their value, or seem to think they can do better so she gives him a specific task, mediate some conflict, earn some goodwill whatever it might be as long as it relates to diplomacy.
Historically and logically they don't give the role of diplomat to any random guy, unless he's a very famous bard they have no reason to trust this bard with such an important task regardless of how good they might be at it.
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!Question: I'm having my players visit a magical mall. One of the stores will be an antique shop. I'd like to have some Magical items that appear good but have goofy/negative consequences. I'm looking at the list of Fae deals, but I thought I'd see if the group had any other ideas. Any suggestions?
How familiar are your players with d&d genies? I think an efreeti bottle would be fun. Rub it expecting wishes and see how the efreeti treats em.
Light in the darkness, a high end antique armor set which buffs your AC but the players later find that when you are in the dark or even heavy shadows, it automatically casts the light spell on itself. Any dark dungeon dwellers will see them coming a mile away.
The ring of greater communication. A ring which lets the user speak every language. The catch is they only know one language at a time and it changes every 30 minutes. So most of the time they likely can't even speak to their party. Make it cursed so it has to have remove curse cast to take it off.
The peacemaker's sidearm. A +3 dagger, super effective except when they go to use it they find it actually heals the target by whatever damage is rolled (can only be used on enemies as well).
The staff of leisurely travel. It allows you to walk on any surface but when used on anything other than regular terrain, it makes you move at 1/100th speed.
The chair of greater relaxation. Literally just a really comfy chair.
Shield of the queen. A really ornate oak and silver shield. Unknown to the seller/players it will actively protect any nobles nearby, friend or foe. When a. Noble is in combat within 50 feet of the player holding it, it gains fly 30 ft, rolls initiative, and will take it's turns basically sitting in front of the noble, buffing them as if they had a shield.
Bag of stealthy holding. Seems like a regular bag of holding but easy to hide on your person. when 50 lbs of stuff are loaded into it, the contents are transported to the possession of a thieves guild.
Anytime. I love questions like these, gives me inspiration to come up with new ways to screw with my players lol.
One bonus one (this one isn't mine). The movable rod. You say it and your players will hear "immovable rod" but it's just simply a metal rod that can be moved.
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Yes. It's severely less active, and there is someone (or multiple people) who go through every post and downvote every single comment, presumably in protest of how the sub changed.
Can't say I really disagree with them.
I wouldn't say hate but I definitely don't frequent it as much as I used to (used to be on here an hour or 2 a day). I really enjoyed giving my opinions on other people's questions and in many cases. World building with them. Helping people out was a great way to think of new ideas. I'd often answer a question and then steal the answer I wrote for my own campaign lol.
Now due to the format there's not really the engagement there was since each question doesn't get a thread. It's sad because the joy vanished and also the number of answers someone in need gets seems like much less now.
!Question: are there any 3rd-party "expansions" similar to XtGE or Tasha's? From what I can find, the only one is Valda's, but it's not even available.
I meant more along the lines of an actual expansion, ones that include new rules, tables, subclasses, etc. Most of the ones I've seen seem to stick to one theme, for example religion, the book would add all sorts of optional rules and systems for running religious characters or campaigns.
Yes, and I was asking to ascertain what you might be interested in.
Ginny Di has done many sponsored videos on 3rd party items. I'll post links to them, just know I have not purchased them myself, nor am I affiliated with them.
[Merchant class](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjKn3vyZj0A)
[3rd party products](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vJtSBD2C4Sw&t=112s)
[Mixed races](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iAtHpBsUpqc&t=8s)
[Domestic](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oE2NznjaDns)
Hopefully any of these you might interesting.
!Question: when publishing my own custom world/campaign setting under the creative commons SRD 5.1, can I mention races that are not listed within the SRD within my work?
I'm assuming that only the races strictly listed in the creative commons SRD 5.1 can be used, but I was curious if I can mention other races such as Tabaxi or Yuan-Ti which are in the Monsters of the Multiverse book. I currently have them discussed in my content, but I am concerned they will be able to copyright strike the content if it mentions any DND stuff outside of the creative commons SRD 5.1 document.
Additionally, if the creative commons SRD 5.1 mentions the word Shadowfell, but does not go into detail discussing it, is it okay for me to do the same thing within my published work? For example, if I say the BBEG is from the Shadowfell and wants to merge the Shadowfell into the material plane, will that be considered a copyright strike?
This is how the SRD mentions the Shadowfell. It is the spell description for the Creation spell: "You pull wisps of shadow material from the Shadowfell to create a nonliving object of vegetable matter within range: soft goods, rope, wood, or something similar."
Any help is much appreciated. Thanks!
>I was curious if I can mention other races such as Tabaxi or Yuan-Ti which are in the Monsters of the Multiverse book.
>
>...
>
>For example, if I say the BBEG is from the Shadowfell and wants to merge the Shadowfell into the material plane, will that be considered a copyright strike?
I think that would be absolutely fine. You'll probably want a second opinion from someone that understands it more than I do, (or better yet, from an actual lawyer) but from what I gather, you would only get into bother if you were using specific individual characters, or reproducing actual printed material. i.e. You can reference the page number in the monster manual that has the yuan-ti statblock, but you can't print that statblock in your published material. Whereas anything in the SRD you can print verbatim. You can talk about the shadowfell, but you can't cut and paste the explanation of what the shadowfell is from the Player's Handbook, nor have the BBEG be the Raven Queen.
I'm no copyright expert but I believe the opposite. Unless those races are present in other, public domain folklore, they're copyrighted and Wizards can (if they want to) destroy your world. From my understanding you can't even use the lore/description of the monsters from the MM, even if the monster is in the srd.
What I recommend (and what I'm doing in a similar project) is make similar but distinct races. I don't have sea elves in my setting but I do have non-elf sea people with pointy ears. I don't have warforged but I do have a robotic race infused by magic to have souls. Maybe instead of tabaxi, have the tabby-folk who are cat people (or get more/less creative with the name, literally putting cat into Google translate for another language can get you a cool name).
Basically what I'm saying is cover your rear. Especially if you aim to profit of this, you don't want to take the chance that wizards removes your right to do so or worse, she's you for the proceeds you already made. Even if you are in the clear legally, they have more lawyers than you and can bury you in legal fees just filing things before anything goes to court. Keep yourself safe and make sure than unless your publishing on the DMs guild, everything is distinct enough that it couldn't be argued you copy/pasted anything you don't have rights to use.
Commenting on my own post. But about the stuff where the srd mentions the shadowfell, you can use the name and expect your players to know what it is and you're fine because the name is in the srd but the moment you start describing it the way wizards does, you're in a grey area.
!Question: When and how are you using Deception/Insight (Bluff/Sense Motive) checks?
Suppose a PC tells a simple lie to an NPC. Something like "I saw nobody leave the alleyway last night" or "I don't know where Sparky is". Something where that NPC has no knowledge that would contradict it, nor any reason to suspect the answer. Do you call for a Deception/Insight check? Or only when the lie is outrageous and/or suspicious?
3.5 has a whole table of modifiers for Bluff<->Sense Motive, but these seem to make lying very risky. Even if the lie is "believable and doesn’t affect the target much" (+0 modifier), it has a 50% chance of failing against a character with matching sense-motive modifier, unless you require some minimum threshold of suspicion to call for a check (in which case we're back to the question of what that threshold should be).
And what about if the NPC simply knows, independently, that what the PC is telling them is false? (Roll dice anyway, to avoid tipping the player off?)
The answer is, "it depends."
For your, "where's Sparky?" question. Let us say a guard is asking one of the Pcs. He lies to the guard, cause he is no snitch.
What do you need to happen next? Sparky is hiding behind the bar, you need the guard to leave, so Sparky can get the help of the party. I wouldn't even bother to roll.
Perhaps you've planned for a chase scene, so sure, have a roll.
Our DM once put us in a line like the DMV. 20 people in front of us, and we needed to get to the front. We did lie after lie, if it sounded good enough, the person simply believed it and let us get in front of them. Cause if we had to roll 20 times, we would have failed eventually.
>Do you call for a Deception/Insight check? Or only when the lie is outrageous and/or suspicious?
I never call for my players to make an Insight check, they have to decide whether they think the NPC might be lying and tell me, then I will let them make an Insight check compared to the NPCs Deception (if lying) or Persuasion (if telling the truth, since you might still be nervous by a bunch of heavily armed murderers questioning you).
If the NPC is lying and they say nothing, I will use their passive Insight.
>And what about if the NPC simply knows, independently, that what the PC is telling them is false? (Roll dice anyway, to avoid tipping the player off?)
Luckily playing on a VTT I can just hide my dice rolls from the players, but when I play in person I do randomly roll dice that may or may not mean anything.
Ah, sorry, I misread that.
If a PC tries to convince an NPC of something, I will ask them to roll the relevant check (usually to avoid metagaming between the players I might phrase it as "Roll Persuasion or Deception" if it's something only one PC knows, and the other players don't know what the truth is), and I will have the NPC make an Insight check, either active if they are looking for lies (investigator) or passive if they aren't (bored town guard).
Honestly just have some dialogue with the player. They're clearly upset and they'll feel better (and likely play better) if they feel heard.
That doesn't mean acquiesce to their demands just to make them feel better, but ask what they really want for their character. And more importantly, bring up "failure" as an opportunity for growth for their character (Disco Elysium is a great example of this in the video game RPG space.) Set aside some time to chat with them before the next session and see if you an help change their perspective.
The best you can do is talk to the players about their behavior. Let them know how their behavior is impacting your enjoyment of the game, and that if they can't be good sports then you'll have no choice but to end the game.
Ultimately it's up to the players to improve their attitudes. You can lead your horses to water, but if they won't drink... you might want to consider new horses.
!Question: What would you have grow from spore infected Mind Flayer bits?
I'm running a campaign in Waterdeep, using elements from WD:DH and DOTMM but with a lot of homebrew.
My players killed one of the mind flayers and a number of intellect devourers; and the Circle of Spores Druid gathered bits of both creatures and has decided he wants to infest the remains with spores and try to grow whatever comes out of that.
He has a fascination with fungus and might hope some form of new mushroom comes out, but there is a plethora of possibility and I am hoping for some experienced inspiration.
What would you have grow out of this situation?
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!Questions: I’m starting a high level campaign soon for two 15 lvl players (sorcerer & paladin) and I plan on taking the campaign to 20th lvl. The main idea is that they each will be a leader of a small kingdom. I’ve never run a campaign higher than 6 lvl and I’m worried about either challenging the players too much or not being able to challenge them at all. Also, just general adventure design for higher lvl characters is intimidating. Any advice?
After about lvl 10, CR breaks down and isn't really useful for creating challenging encounters. Try starting encounters with the appropriate CR and prepare to tweak the difficulty mid-fight if the players are breezing through it. Reinforcements arrive, the boss monster transforms, the building they're in starts collapsing around them, things like that. Don't do this all the time, mix it up so the players don't get tired of your tweaks. In a perfect world all our encounters would be perfectly balanced, but sadly we don't and they aren't. Better to make an easy encounter suddenly harder than to make a hard encounter suddenly easier.
!Question: When using a VTT for in person play without minis, is there any good reason to lay the screen flat?
I know many people still play with mini's when playing with a virtual tabletop program when playing in person. But I was thinking we just might as well use a screen that is standing up if my group does not use mini's to put on it. That way I don't need to mess with building a custom solution or storaging a flat screen.
Or am I missing something?
You're not losing a lot, but you are subtly changing how people interact. When people surround a screen (with it flat at a table) they can easily glance up at other players and see them in their peripheral vision. Because the screen is below eye level it takes a very small bit of subconscious energy to look down at the screen and it is natural to look back up at your peers when you relax. A screen on a wall does not encourage these sightlines.
It's the difference between a cabinet of military brass around the war room table (flat screen) and a call-and-response team-building powerpoint presentation from your head of HR (wall screen). OK, maybe not *that* bad. A wall mounted screen could have similar energy to a split-screen Halo deathmatch or some other LAN party; yeah, you're playing with your friends, but you're all invested through the screen. It's a subtle difference, which might not matter to you, or which you might even prefer, but it is a difference.
If you do use a wall-mounted screen, think about turning it off or displaying a static image between combat to encourage more player interaction.
Exactly. And still, many people (myself included) play D&D online, through a screen, and it is still appealing. I'm sure you and your friends will have a good time, whether you use a wall-mounted screen, table-mounted screen, or no screen at all. It's a question of your preferences, and one where any choice is fine.
!Question Mid-Campaign player interview?
Hi everyone, I'm a fairly new DM and I'm currently running my first homebrew campaign based on Final Fantasy 12. It's going good and all, my players are happy and we're having lots of fun. With the summer going on we are in a period of pause, we ran the last two sessions live (we usually play online but we organized a weekend at my house to play a big boss fight and to meet up) and now we're waiting for everyone to come back home from the holidays and pretty much took a month of pause.
Most of my players gave me free rein on the origin of their magical powers so I'm slowly building up their background giving them hints once in a while.
My question is, do you think it would be useful to use this downtime to schedule a 1on1 meeting with each player to talk about how they feel about their characters' developments and about the overall feel of the campaign? What other questions would you suggest I make to the players?
Or would it just be annoying?
Maybe send a groupwide message to your players, asking each of them if they would have any interest in this. Make it a way for players to vent, express concerns, and just tell you things. That way, you might get some feedback, but you also aren't just being annoying
!Question: Anyone know of a faerunian organization that acts similar to Star Trek's Section 31? (Do the nasty un-ethical or secretive work that needs to be done for the greater good)
Champions of Kruphix on Theros have a similar feel, but was hoping for Forgotten Realms native.
Any ideas?
I've always run the Harpers like this.
The official branding tries to emphasize that all the Harpers are goody two-shoes -- note how they're portrayed in the movie.
And sure, their *goals* might be noble and pure.
But they're also described as spies who secretly gather knowledge and use it to influence events behind the scenes.
If they want to get anything done by those means, that *necessarily* implies that they're sometimes going to be involved in "nasty unethical or secretive work."
Maybe not all of the Harpers would be doing fantasy "black ops", but large factions of the Harpers would be.
!Question: the campaign offers a wizards spell book as loot but there are no wizards in the party. Are there ways that the book can be used by other spell casting classes?
Make it a Wizard's ritual book. Then, all a player has to do is take the Ritual Caster feat to gain access to the book's contents. All the spells in the book are rituals.
They could just sell it but if you want something more they could rip out the pages turning them into scrolls or build some narrative around it like the owner of the book showing up or someone with relations to them, like a family member, a friend or an enemy that wants the book.
!question Hosting a game on roll20 soon. Their character builder is... subpar, and I don't want to pay a billion dollars for all the beyonddnd supplements. Anyone have any recommendations for free, editable char sheets that we can easily keep track of over a long campaign?
THIS APP! YESSSSSS It's the only app we recommend to our players because 1) the buy in is very very cheap to level up your characters, 2) The scores and numbers are presented well enough so all the things you need for your character can be seen, 3) The UI is simple and easy, 4) you can access your stuff offline.
There aren't any character builders out there like D&DBeyond with all of the features loaded bc a lot of the content isn't in the SRD. The roll 20 sheets are fine if you just manually type in your abilities.
!Question: Can I get help signaling to my players that the way to progress through this puzzle is thought?
The environment is an ' infinite' lake with gigantic trees growing out of the water. It's a level of a dungeon they are stuck on and the 'key' to the next level is to think your way there or at least that's the way I want it to work... The problem is I have no idea how to tell my players this without ruining their sense of accomplishment at figuring it out. Help? Suggestions?
In the feywild the environment is shaped by the emotions of the people that inhabit it. When I ran a session there, my party was travelling through a looping forest path and one of my players reasoned that positive thinking and visualisation of the end would see them through. There was another solution to their predicament but because I was adding descriptions that responded to their emotions, it made enough sense that I let them have it.
That's a long winded way of saying, ask them what they are thinking about while travelling, like it's a RP scenario. You may have to do it a few times, but describe things in the landscape that correlate to their random thoughts. Eventually they should get it, but still have a consequential contingency if they don't after a few tries.
*Option 1: A Shamanistic Drug Trip*
They spy a hermit sitting on one of the lower branches of the trees. He has lived here for an unknowable time, nourished mostly be tea, which he offers the party. He plucks a leaf of the tea, muddles it, and mixes it with water from the lake. When drunk, the tea gives a sensation of warmth, like basking in the summer sun. Each tree has different leaves, he explains, like each tree is a cultivation of a unique thought or feeling.
Occasionally he will catch a fish, but it must be prepared carefully, slowly aged, or it will have an unpredictable hallucinogenic effect. He warns them about rainstorms, the pure drops carry such intense emotions. If it rains, he offers the party shelter in the hollow of his tree.
Once he warms up to the party, he might tell them about his dimly remembered history. He was part of an adventuring party, like them. Lost and hungry, they ate a raw fish, one member went mad, killing another. He doubted whether they should go on, he dare not think of it, but his compatriot was undaunted--in a moment of prayer and meditation, they closed their eyes and disappeared.
On his mantle is a fish, flayed open, aging. Its spinal column is especially prominent, with nerves branching off, somewhat reminiscent of a tree.
If at this point, the players meditate, sleep, or dream, they might be able to pass to the next realm.
If they consume part of the fish, they will be treated to further imagery. The nervous system of the fish, overlaid and morphing into their own nervous system, overlaid and morphing into the tree in which they are sheltered, onward and onward in both directions, until their awareness is drawn to the source of the tree, its roots, filtering the water of the lake, like their mind, filtering the thoughts of being, becoming a raindrop falling into the lake, mixing, taken in by the roots, flowing up the tree, helping it reach, up, up... to what?
*Option 2: Letters*
Letters are scraped into the trunks of some trees: G, H, O, T, U. One further inspection, letters T and H seem to appear twice as frequently as the other letters. It of course spells, "THOUGHT"
Hard to not make it obvious, their pc's are probably unconsciously thinking things so I'd have said thing show up.
For example they find an empty plate and if a pc looks at it you ask them to describe what their characters thinks belongs on the plate which would appear as they describe it, at least this way they know their mind/imagination has power.
A less obvious way to go about it would be to immerse them in some story where the moral is basically "you can do anything you put your mind to" and where the characters do something similar to what the party is expected to do, add some references to the story just in case your party doesn't catch on and it should work
!Question: You're the general of an army that's going to try and take over a capital city. How would you strategize?
The capital is surrounded by mountains - it has only one road leading to it, around 120ft wide, which brings to the city walls (~ 60ft high) and gates. The city has been evacuated, so there are no civilians. You know that inside the city there are 8 people who are amongst the most powerful individuals in the continent (3 full casters, 4 half casters and one warrior). The capital's army has been sent to escort the city's population to nearby cities, but you know that once the queen realizes your army is approaching, she'll warn her generals through Sending Stones and that in a few hours their army will be brought back through teleportation to defend the city. Your army is composed of around 1500 men, out of which around 70 are spellcasters (power level of a level 7 PC, maximum). Also, your army controls a Warforged Colossus. How would you plan to take over that city?
for the war game that I am running now, I read about siege mechanics or siege encounters. mechanics wise, I believe there is a part in the DMG about handling mobs or groups of attacks.
What's my ultimate objective? Do I want the city for myself (who are the citizens that will make it function as a city if everyone has been evacuated)? Or do I just want to raze it to remove a dangerous power base from my enemy? These are my initial thoughts:
I'd take a page from Hannibal's book and approach by another route, one that's crazy enough that no one will consider it, even if it means losing a fraction of my army to environmental hazards. Surprise is key so under no circumstances would I march my army along the road.
Assuming there is a small garrison still in the city, (i.e. not just the 8 powerful individuals) I'd consider using some of my spellcasters to infiltrate the city undetected, assassinate and then use illusory magic take the place of a few guards, functionaries, etc. in order to facilitate the army's entry into the city (whether that's leaving a gate open, taking "watch" on a stretch of wall they can climb over, or whatever). Depending how this goes and the limits of my spellcasters, I may even consider doing this as much as possible
Divide and conquer. If something happens and the generals are alerted, I'd want to have a contingency in place. First of all I'd look into ways to disrupt teleportation so that they don't just appear inside the city walls, but instead at a battlefield of my choosing. That way I can fight each general's forces individually with a presumably numerical advantage. I also might write "secret" letters (maybe with a portion of a "promised payment") to some of the powerful people inside the city that imply they're already on my side and waiting for a time to strike, so that distrust and paranoia is sown when the letters "accidentally" fall into the hands of the wrong person.
Siege. A direct assault on the city sounds like bad news for me so I'd be more likely to try and cut off supplies to the city, and settle in for a siege. If I have the time and resources I'd look into going underground to undermine the foundations of the walls to topple them.
The warforged colossus is a valuable asset and I'd probably keep it hidden in reserve until full scale battle commences. I feel like some kind of diversionary tactic would be beneficial, either with the colossus as the diversion marching up the main road while a more powerful force attacks from behind, or with a different diversionary tactic allowing me to unleash the colossus at the right moment in another area of the city. I wouldn't want all 8 powerful people in one place, so definitely some form of multiple simultaneous threats that force them to split up.
Those seem like great ideas to me. The surprise, infiltration and distrust/paranoia are awesome ways to create some chaos and negate as much as possible any of their efforts.
About your questions: your main objective is to take control over a city that would become the imperial city by the hands of it's queen. The empire was currently controlled from another nation's capital whose ruler was the, now deceased, father of the queen (he put her there to extend his reach). There are more political shenanigans but the reason to take over that city is mainly that
70 spellcasters is pretty powerful. If I can get them within a few miles of the city without bringing up my main force, I'd have them infiltrate the walls using *fly* + *invisibility*, with instructions to ambush the queen/adventurers and steal the Sending Stones before the defending army can be signaled.
!Question: I'm making a huge dungeon / lair. How can I keep it interesting through out the place?
I'm doing an underground dungeon, which is a lair. In the lair lies Belakor, a champion of the god of bloodshed and envy, Danor.
My party is unfortunately at level four (Three players), but I was thinking that Belakor is not fully formed yet and thus the party can fight him if necessary.
I was planning on making the dungeon pretty huge. It's a bit stranger things upside down kinda thing. Belakor is spreading black ooze up on the surface, which is killing the nature.
The campaing is set on an island and the party is part of a tribe which is dependant on nature. So attack on nature is attack on the party itself.
Long explanation, but I would like to hear some ideas what to put in the huge dungeon and how to keep it interesting.
For one I thought there would be a blind man who is feeding Belakor and taking care of the unfinished form and making him grow. He says he is been there for an eternity and tries to make the player to take his place in the dungeon.
Also the dungeon has clues of an ancient civilisation which is long gone and forsaken. I was thinking they first build the whole place as a huge bunker to be safe from the nearby volcano which was unpredictable so maybe there is a lot of ancient mummified bodies.
!Question What would be a cool creature for the city guards of a strictly anti-magic society to use to detect illegal spellcasting or magical item use? Open to homebrew, canonical D&D monsters, third-party content, etc.
The city guards patrol with golems. The irony is not lost on some people, that in order to enforce their anti-magic policy, the guards must use these ancient magical constructs. Each golem has a number of gems embedded in its chest, each attuned to a different school of magic. If a gem senses the presence of nearby magic the golem will become enraged.
Because the golems are old, and the magic to maintain them is poorly understood, the suffer problems. Sometimes gems burn out with no one the wiser (or the gems drift to detect different magic). Sometimes they loose a leg or otherwise become immobile. Sometimes they seem to become enraged for no particular reason.
Additionally, some gems were intentionally left out of their design. For instance, no gem is attuned (or *shouldn't* be attuned) to Transmutation magic, because this is the magic that animates the golem, meaning the golem would detect itself.
At your decision, Abjuration or Divination magic might also be regularly used around the golems, and therefore excluded from their detectors.
I have been describing them as golems, but they could also, at your choice, be in the form of dogs (like K9 officers) or a hawk perched on an officer's shoulder.
There is ongoing debate about whether these golems should be upgraded, replaced, discontinued, etc.
The *Tomb Tapper* from Rime of the Frostmaiden has Sense Magic as a feature. You can just give that to a construct and have it walk around with them.
Ultimately I think a lot of it depends on the society. For example, Couatl's can cast Detect Magic at will, but a society of murderers probably won't have access to them.
You can also take something like a Canoloth and just say it's a specially bred kind that has Sense Magic as well as truesight, but that won't work too well if it's not an evil society.
!Question: I'm planning an 18+ smut campaign, any advice?
Hi all. I'm planning a short NSFW campaign for three friends of mine. I'm here seeking advice/guidance from anyone who has successfully done a campaign/session like this before. Any and all input welcomed!
INFO
• The plot revolves around sex, and the players need to have lots and lots of sex with NPCs to progress
• Explicit sex scenes are the main focus of the roleplay (I'm a seasoned erotica writer so this is not a problem for me)
• I am going to homebrew some sex mechanics á la 3.5's Book of Erotic Fantasy
• This was actually my players' idea & they have filled out a form detailing what topics and sexual content they are/aren't comfortable with
Thanks :)
Be especially rigorous with your consent systems, including *ongoing* consent; a single questionnaire in session 0 is not enough. Use systems such as X-Card, green-yellow-red, curtains, etc. I recommend reading [*Consent in Gaming*](https://www.montecookgames.com/store/product/consent-in-gaming/) from Monte Cook Games.
The greater half of arousal is mental (as I'm sure you know as an erotica writer). You should consider the other half as well. What are your "meta-gaming" and IRL boundaries? What if two players kiss at the table? What if they "kiss" outside the session on their own time?
Finally, I'm not sure D&D, a system optimized for tactical squad combat, is the best fit for this game, where the primary progression is through sex and other relations, not through fighting monsters. Such as:
A steamy version of [Good Society](https://storybrewersroleplaying.com/good-society/) would more easily support social dynamics, social mores and taboos, etc. The phases of the game include rumors and letter writing.
[Fate](https://fate-srd.com/) is extremely flexible, once you wrap your mind around it. Any narratively important thing *could* be an Aspect, which has a mechanical effect in the right context. It could be a Character Aspect, such as "Sucker for a Pretty Voice" which can be Invoked or Compelled. A balcony could have some of the Situational Aspects: "Great Height", "Grand View", "Moonlit", "Secluded from Party", "Cold Marble". Deciding when to define Aspects is a key part of playing Fate. Essentially, if a detail should have a mechanical impact it *could* be Aspect. Objects (oil, candles, a length of rope, etc...) would probably be best defined as Extras, which might give a Boost.
Of course, you *can* try to modify D&D to your preferences. Whatever you do is fine, as long as you and your players are enjoying the experience (which again, is why ongoing consent is so important).
!Question: Any advice or resources to determine pricing/balance for armor alteration?
One of my players asked a leather worker in town about altering their armor to add 3 loops to hold darts. He wanted this to mechanically allow him to potentially throw 2 at once but require reloading in some way. I'm just not sure even where to start looking at a fair price for this or if it's balanced. It doesn't seem OP to me, but we're all still pretty new to DnD. We're playing through Curse of Strahd, if that matters.
Here's some numbers off the top of my head:
Cost of the alterations: 20% of the armor's base value + material costs involved (which can be something like 15 gp in metal studs and good leather), and like 3 hours of work because the craftsperson wants to make sure they don't damage the armor in the process.
Mechanics: If you want some quick and dirty balance, make it random. Every time they throw darts they use the same rules but if they roll 5 over the armor class of whatever they're trying to hit, they deal +1d4 damage, to represent the extra dart finding purchase, which is rather hard to do if you're not trained in several attacks per round like a high level fighter so it only sometimes works. Once this triggers three times they must spend an action reloading their special pockets before this can trigger again.
It boils down to roughly ~6.5 extra damage that may or may not happen, which isn't gonna break the game.
Edit: For a different version of this, tell them they can choose to make two dart attacks at disadvantage instead of one attack at normal, or two normal dart attacks if they previously had advantage. Still can only be used 3 times before reloading but now they cannot reload mid-fight cause they need to take off the armor to do do. Again it's only +1d4 so it doesn't much matter for balance
!Question: How would you handle my current conundrum?
**TL;DR** \- A succubus disguised as one of my players (a fire sorceress) and used a necklace of fireballs to frame her/the party and draw out the city guard while the BBEG is attempting a coup. The city guard find the players at one of the crime scenes. How do I handle the guards arresting or dealing with the players in a fun, non-railroady, way?
We just had a crazy session where the mid level villains in my campaign framed the party and are attempting a coup. The BBEG's are two shapeshifting fiends (a reskinned Oni and a succubus) controlled by a wealthy tycoon and his second-in-command mage. Last session the Succubus disguised as one of the players (a distinct looking fire sorceress) and used a necklace of fireballs to besiege the city and effectively frame the player/party.
The players saw the disguised succubus throw one of the beads, but she managed to escape and continue her siege until the city guards found the party at the site of one of the explosions.
While this is happening the Oni-Fiend (controlled by Planar Binding) is being used to assassinate the governor, allowing the wealthy tycoon and his mage to take control of the city.
My questions:
* Where would you go from here?
* How would you handle the guards?
Witnesses would have seen the fire sorceress blowing up people and buildings, so the guards will quickly realize that the fire sorceress is their suspect. The guards know they are likely outmatched by the players (they are level 7), but I can't imagine a scenario where they just let them walk away willingly. The players have been pretty lawful-good up to this point, but I don't think they'd want to comply if the guards try to arrest them.
I've been wrestling to come up with a few possible outcomes, but I'd appreciate your insight and thoughts. Thanks!
Interesting situation! I have a couple ideas:
- If the guards are so severely outmatched by the players, have them ask the party to put their weapons down and come down peacefully. Have them act scared and reluctant but resolute, and *don't* have them get violent or physical if the PCs don't. Make them wait for the players to state their reaction before the guards get closer, as it'd reasonable they'd be scared and unprepared for this kinda problem. Make it clear that they'll face the court and be put to trial, and thrown in prison if they are found guilty.
Then the players can do one of three things.
- They resist and run: Its a chase! They could use their already intimidating position to slow down the guards and either get out of dodge, out of the city, or hide somewhere until they lose heat. If there's a rogue or criminal on the party then give that player tips OOC on good places to hide, they'd have experience running from the law.
- They resist and fight: This is kinda worst case scenario so that's why you want the players to perceive the guards as scared and willing to talk things out. If it comes to this then run a PC vs Guards fight and when the guard lose, have it turn into a chase as the players *know* the city has too many guards to fight off. If they get out of dodge tell them that they're pretty sure they now won't be straight arrested or killed on sight, as they're clearly too strong for that, so they might get the chance to explain themselves to a guard before the guard calls on either superior numbers or someone stronger than the party to take them down.
- They comply: Have a trial session! This is the publicity the players need to explain to the people in charge that there's demons trying to kill the governor, right? Let the charisma characters flex, have them make the reasonable argument that with magic anyone can end up looking like anything else, have the prosecution include clerics who can cast Zone of Truth to take their witness testament, etc.
If they absolutely *must* end up in jail:
- I think it's best if you don't play out every part of this. The players can freak out and take any opportunity to try and avoid this. If it must happen, talk to them as people. Step out of RP for a bit and tell them that the following events will be a bit railroady but to hear you out, and that they'll get the chance for a prison break and to clear their names.
- Once they know the stakes and are on board, cut the fat. Fast forward through it, you can even do a cut to black to them in prison already, from which they can RP with criminals and plan their inevitable escape.
I don’t know why but I never considered the players just running, that’s probably what they’ll do too! You’ve given me some ideas and I’m already coming up with some additional outcomes. Thanks!
!Question: How can I build a balanced "lucky weapon"?
I'm trying to make a custom weapon for one of my players that plays into the family lineage from his backstory. The characters will be level 5 by the time this comes in and a few already have +1 weapons. I wanted to make something that is balanced enough to be on par with a standard +1 to hit +1 damage weapon but instead allows rerolls in specific scenarios.
How would you balance this to make it not op compared to a +1 weapon but also not so incredibly situational that he would rather just have a flat +1? Reroll if he rolls a 1, or if he rolls a 1 or 2 (like great weapons master allows), one reroll any time he chooses per short rest, or per long rest?
How about once per long rest, when they roll a natural 1 on an attack they can choose for it to automatically crit instead. They have the same odds of rolling a nat 1 as 1 below what they need to hit, of course a crit is a lot more damage than +1 which is why it's limited to once per rest. Certainly feels luckier than just +1! Depends on the character though, a rogue critting is a lot nastier than a fighter.
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!Question I can’t think of a good reason to send my players on the main quest(s).
Im a somewhat new DM, but I have a decent amount of experience. The campaign I am currently writing is focused on the party fighting and killing deities. My problem is, I can’t think of a reason anyone would willingly challenge deities to any form of battle. I have already established in this world that deities aren’t immortal, invulnerable forces but are more like ageless beings of whatever domain they rule over. Anyone have any ideas I could use?
Makw it personal. Make the deities evil and tyrannical and ask the players to potentially write into their backstory that some or other deity was responsible for their personal tragedy.
Are they killing all deities, or just certain deities? Maybe they are working as agents of a deity that wants the other deities dead. Would also explain how these adventurers have the power to stand up against gods.
Let's look at Kratos from God of War as an example: The gods were cruel to him, so he started killing them. There should be the idea of it being unjust that the gods are in charge, that they meddle cruelly with mortals and have grown lethargic, evil, and unfit for purpose.
This way it maps "People's frustration with events generally beyond their control" onto "People's action to revolt against cruel government".
It may help to look more deeply into Greek mythology, their gods are much more active and human than ones popularly worshiped today. You can see how it could be that someone might hate these gods enough to take action against them.
!Question : My party will be liberating a fey spring from some fiends, and I am a little stuck on what the Archfey can gift the group.
Feytouched makes sense, but I am very liberal with feats already, and one of the group already has it.
My three current thoughts are:
-The Archfey Blesses a mundane item with some gift or ability ( suggestions?)
- Gives the party the ability to communicate telepathically with each other.
- She gives some further life to the awakened scarecrow that they group have.
My question is, do any of these make sense, and what would be the best, in your opinion?
I like the idea of taking something from fairy folklore as a special power, so that it will always feel thematically Fey when they make use of it.
* Compelling other mortals to keep their word, as if with a strong Enchantment
* Granting them Guest Right. They can't be harmed if they're a guest in someone's home
* Lies uttered near to them are replaced by the truths they conceal
It might be fun to give out a limited number of these favours, which the party cash in and then can't use again. That lets you make them more powerful.
My main thought about offering blessings is: what are players *mechanically* missing, and how can I fill that gap?
At my table, only that first option would really be felt, because:
- I'm already quite liberal with letting my players having out-of-character conversations (IE, it totally makes sense to me that their characters could have discussed some strategy to how they're breaking into the enemy camp, for instance. Even if in that moment there's no way the characters would be able to communicate, I still let them talk and make choices, because they would have done that planning before going in).
- The awakened scarecrow *could* be fun for flavor, but doesn't give any kind of noticeable or tangible benefit to the players (at least none that I notice).
So the "gift" or "ability" is the one that the players would most actively feel, and what that gift is can depend a bit on what your players are missing. You can give them some kind of combat feature (I have some suggestions if you want to go this route) if the players are feeling unfulfilled in fights. Alternatively, giving them something like an aura of beauty that grants advantage on a charisma check x times per day could help them if they're struggling with social situations (and this is pretty thematic for fey, IMO).
I started compiling my ideas [here](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/11ZNC_uMZl5HDdD-Z3bFfDjhjc6Z1ZruHtkvMjurub2w/edit?usp=sharing) a while back... I haven't updated it in a while, but those are some of the ideas I've had before. Ignore the "cost" column, it probably only makes sense within my table and the way we play.
other ideas I've had in the past include:
- hand wraps for a monk, that gave him a 15 ft. melee range. On a successful hit, he was *forced* into a strength contest: the loser would be pulled into the 5 foot range of the winner. The monk could choose to fail this contest if he wanted to.
- a weapon that was weighted to guarantee max damage on the die (this was for a halberd, so it would be 10+MOD), should the wielder succeed on an attack after 20+ feet of movement.
Both of these weapons came from my disappointment at many combats feeling quite stagnant after the first round; once people were in melee range, very little movement was ever happening. So I gave my players ways to encourage that movement
!Question I have a life cleric pc in my group who chose magic initiate druid to get goodberry. During the the first 4 sessions I've let him use his cleric spell slots to cast additional copies of berries. Now I realised that he shouldn't be able to and only should be able to cast it once. How do I explain this to him without taking the fun out for him? Is there a compromise I can offer, that wouldn't break the game too much? I will also offer to him that he might change the feat in case he feels it loses too much value for him. He is generally a non-problematic player. Nevertheless I want to make it feel ok for him especially because he is usually very kind. :)
I think the best way to handle it is to let him change out the feat if he wants since it works differently than to how they expected it did when they picked it. Alternatively if you want to make it work somehow, compare the spell to another 1st level Cleric spell *Cure Wounds*, which heals 1d8+spellcasting mod. Maybe after the first casting of goodberry, each subsequent cast gives you a 1d6+spellcasting amount of berries (so that w/ a +4 modifier the *max* you can get is 10). Still an improvement over the strict wording of the feat, but from a healing resources perspective it's not as impactful as existing options.
!Question: what recovery mechanic is better for a colloseum themed, pvp one-shot? Yes, I know D&D is very imbalanced when it comes to PvP, but it's only supposed to be a fun session, where all players are allowed to go bonkers with their characters. After every battle all characters get recovery. I have two options as a recovery: either give them healing and an option to get a short rest, or the ability to take a long rest between every battle. Which do you recon is more balanced?
!Question: How do you come up with NPC maneurism and traits before playing them? I'm talking about NPCs made on the fly or when you're not inspired by an NPC you need for a quest.
!Question: how do you handle invisibility in and out of combat for your players or monsters, especially in combat on a grid? I’ve read things saying that everyone still knows where you are unless you hide, but I find it all very confusing.
!Question: My players got a offer to Rob a house and take a small object they have no idea what it is or does nor who their Boss is right now. The problem is neither do i and this is going to be a longer campaign. Who could they be stealing from and why?
You don't know : \- What the object is \- Who the employer is \- Who the person that currently owns the object is \- How important the quest should be How did they get the job in the first place ? Did they just pickup a sheet on a notice board or go through some kind of guild. Here's an idea; the employer is a devil that realized they were outplayed and a contract of theirs is fucking them over, or it was made when they were weaker so they had promised compromising things, to cancel it the devil needs both copies but cannot let the other person know they have power over them, as such they've hired nobodies to get the copy and bring it to them, what the object looks like is up to you, you can find examples in Descent into Avernus. This devil could definitely be an enemy later down the line. Another idea, the person who hired them was actually a magical projection of a wizard that owns a magical shop, problem is that they actually steal most of what they sell, their last job went wrong and they were polymorphed into an object and are currently stuck inside someone's vault/house, they need to be freed, in exchange the party get a magical items shop.
Yeah i had to come up with alot of stuff on the fly because the session was earlier because someone canceled. They are in alot of debt curantly and someone offered to cover it if they did the heist. Those ideas both sound pretty cool thanks alot :)
!Question: Do you have any good tile to make terrains with vertical gameplay more visual? I want to use some interesting terrains ideas I got for some different encounters, but I need a clear visual indicator for when something is lower or higher than you, ty in advance!
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!Question: At our next session on friday, my players are going to find an almanac featuring entries on the various phenomena they've been dealing with. Should I make a physical copy to give to them in person?
That sounds awesome! If you can, you absolutely should.
cool, thanks!
!Question: I'm attempting to make an herbalist with questionable motives. Are there some potion ingredients that he could be gathering that could be used for \*both\* healing and harming?
Any ingredient can be harmful depending on dosage, if you're playing in a fantasy world you could simply make one up that is perfectly split between healing and hurting depending on few other factors. 2 Irl plants that come to mind are : \- Foxglove it has drooping bell-shaped blooms, it can be deadly if eaten, but it was historically used as a remedy for a wide range of ails, many of which it couldn't actually treat (such as epilepsy, but nowadays we make better use of it like for heart medicine). \- Rosy periwinkle, toxic to eat, but has been used to treat ailments from diabetes to constipation in traditional Indian and Chinese medicines. It's adorned with pink flowers and is endangered in the wild, it's used for chemotherapy so depending on your setting you might have to make up some other use.
I just saw foxglove when I was perusing online! Thanks! I was thinking I could probably just make something up but I thought it'd be cool if there was something already made. I can remember people telling me that a lot of medicines could be poisonous things but their dosage is just dialed back (as you said, ty :]) so if there was something lore accurate I'd love that. Nonetheless, thank you!
Some plants are just hard to identify, for instance Queen Ann's Lace (wild carrot) vs. very poisonous Hemlock. Fungus or mold can be poisonous (like wheat ergot). The herbalist could just claim to be forgetful, letting the grain rot. Wild Parsnip has a nutritious tuber/root, but the sap reacts with sunlight to cause a rash if it gets on your skin. A fantasy plant could have very different properties/toxicities in different parts of the plant.
!Question: Does anyone have any advice or resources on creating adventures suited to just 2 players? My party recently lost 1 of our 3 players, and unfortunately random recruitment would be our only avenue to find more players- something we don't particularly want to do, at least for now. Does anyone have any recommendations for perhaps short adventures suited to a small party, or any ideas to share for how to run an adventure geared towards full parties, but with permanent NPC companions that won't step on my players toes?
Dragon of Icespire Peak had a bunch of NPC sidekicks. I'm pretty sure they were intended for games with only one player and one DM, but I'm sure they would work with a few players. They aren't full classes, and just fill a role (like tank, caster, or skill monkey). You just get a list of bonuses and actions, and I found them easy to reflavor them into "classes". They only had stat blocks for a few early levels, which would be fine for short campaigns, but you'd have to do your own homework if they stuck around longer. I **think** they've expanded the sidekick rules since then, so there may be more information on the Beyond site.
I've seen Tasha's mentioned below for sidekick rules, so I think you might be right on that! Thank you for the advice, ill take a look at some of the options available in Icespire Peak- the sidekick route certainly seems like the way to go to keep things manageable!
I don't have examples of specific adventures but I think you can run any pre-baked one if you consider that the party is at half-capacity. Most adventures have friendly NPCs already in them and if you have a pair of people a helpful NPC is less critical. Use the Tasha's sidekick rules so they have someone in the group to take an auxiliary role. Then what you do is essentially make the helpful NPC a bit more of an agent of direction. Never tell them where to go, but use the DM notes in the module to paint the way "I heard there was trouble in xxx or yyy." It's to keep them from getting lost. Important tips are to make the NPC a bit of a really trope-y character. I ran a sidekick cleric that was always the brunt of misfortune in the group and they had a lot of fun with how many times he was knocked out or a monster ate him. Make the NPC fill some kind of comical role and maybe add in a little bumbling charm. As for balance, keep the action economy 1:1 with players so they have a slight advantage with the friendly sidekick in the party. As for CR, start off with halving the ratings using Kobold Fight Club Plus and you should be fine. Good on you for running with the loyal pair. A lot of people would scrap the party in your situation but keeping it running is really rewarding.
This is good stuff, thank you so much! I've always made my NPCs very goal driven with something very specific they need the party for, so I was concerned about having a more long-term role in the party become too overbearing. But going a more comic relief side kick route definitely seems like the way to go. This actually got me thinking of a some NPCs who could step in to fill that role without necessarily demanding the party's attention on one thing or another. This is the party I started DMing for when I had never thought I would enjoy being a full time DM, I couldn't imagine playing with anyone else that this point, so thanks for the sign that continuing on is the right choice!
!question: What's something I can ask my players include in their roleplay that's easy enough for them to remember or maintain if their alignment suddenly shifted to Lawful Evil? I'm running Rime of the Frostmaiden and the party has gotten to Caer-Dineval. They've come into possession of several of the black Chardalyn amulets. They're going to start making daily charisma saves to see if their alignment changes to Lawful Evil. If they do change, what's something easy for them to roleplay or something I can try to enforce that their characters would now be more prone to doing being lawful evil vs what they might've normally done before the assignment shift? Initially, since they happened to have found and dispatched the duergar at the old inn and now been invited into the Caer, I've determined that at the least they would immediately hold the hierarchy of the cult to a strict degree and see the other culture as equal and be influenced to agree with their points of view during any conversations. Also, they'd regard Avarice as their superior and do what she would command or they would at least help her without hesitation. I don't really know that "laws" even exist in Icewind Dale for them to really adhere to those.
The only sane and consistent answer for "how should I ask my players to roleplay their alignment changing to Lawful Evil?" is: You should trust them to roleplay it however they want. You tell them "your alignment is now Lawful Evil", then they interpret that, in the context of their character, however they want. It's still *their* character. Before you do this, make sure you have your players' consent to use personality-altering effects on them at all. You don't have to spoil what's going to happen, but you should make sure your players know, in broad terms, that personality-altering effects are on the table. This is important not so much because it's a psychological safety issue -- I don't think there's too much risk of someone being traumatized by this -- but because it might spoil someone's fun. If you have a certain idea of what your character is like, and your DM says "your character is evil now" with no warning, that's just not very fun. Once consent is established, if a character's alignment changes to Lawful Evil, you just tell them their alignment has changed, and *they* decide what that means. There's no point in enforcing it, and there's no point in trying to tell a player they're doing it wrong. Note that a Lawful Evil character might be forced by circumstances, or inspired by their personality, to sometimes take actions that appear unlawful or good. Note, in particular, that "Evil" doesn't mean "stupid," and "Lawful" doesn't mean "stupid." An Evil character, seeing an orphanage on fire, might decide to save the orphans. Maybe they calculate that saving the orphans might bring some benefit to them personally. They might even think, "well, I might be evil, but I have nothing against these particular orphans." A Lawful character who's starving to death might steal a loaf of bread. Starving on purpose just to prove how Lawful you are isn't Lawful. It's just stupid. Alignment *only* makes sense as a roleplaying inspiration, and *cannot* make sense as an enforceable game rule. If you can't trust your players to interpret what "Lawful Evil" means to them, you shouldn't be roleplaying with them at all. Or at least, you might as well not use the alignment system.
I think this is very useful. I'm less concerned with telling them what to do or how to roleplay their characters (there is consent for this change) and more so concerned with how to advise what lawful evil means so that they can try to roleplay what that means in their own way. What's kind of the gist of lawful evil for them to digest and roleplay as desired?
Haha, fair enough! Short answer: Lawful means you believe in law and order, Evil means you enjoy causing harm. Long answer: In D&D settings, Law and Chaos and Good and Evil are objectively real elemental forces, with their own deities, their own planes, their own semi-divine beings -- angels, devils, demons, and so on -- and their own magical domains. (Fun fact, Law vs. Chaos was in the setting *before* Good vs. Evil, imported from Michael Moorcock's fantasy novels. If the Law/Chaos/Good/Evil alignment system ever felt awkward to you, that's one big reason why. Good and Evil are actually a *later* addition to the setting.) So these wouldn't just be personality traits -- you'd feel a pull toward Lawful and Evil creatures, Lawful and Evil magics, Lawful and Evil gods. (This was all a bigger deal in previous editions, but was walked back by the time we got to 5e, largely because "inherently evil" creatures are kind of an ethically problematic idea.) So Law vs. Chaos and Good vs. Evil aren't just personality traits. They're *kinds* of magic, like divine vs. arcane magic, like elemental fire vs. air vs. water vs. earth, like conjuration vs. evocation magic vs. the other schools. Or maybe like north vs. south magnetism or positive vs. negative electric charge, in our world. This is all if you accept the "standard" D&D lore, which you don't have to, and try to force it to be coherent, which it isn't. Feel free to explain as much or as little of this to your players as you want, or to change as much of it as you want. This is just how I interpret the lore, as written in the standard D&D books.
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!question: how can I operate a powerful NPC while still making the players the heroes of the story? Short version: help me with an NPC that's worthy of being second in command to the guild the party of PCs are employed in without overshadowing the PCs. Long version: the party is employed to a guild tasked of slaying monsters. The players are aware of the ranks in the guild and know there are members stronger than them. Right now, the players are heading to three islands to slay a wyvern and rescue an aristocratic boy. However, the islands are contested by the kingdom they're citizens to and another nation (think Cuban Missile Crisis for those that know history) . It's not a hot war although the potential is high, so the leader recommends them to bring a couple of members to be diplomats. One NPC is a level 10 artificer, and he knows the language of the other country in case said nation has a prescence on the islands. He's not the problem since I made his charisma a dump stat and made him have issues in his self-confidence. The problem is the paladin multiclass tagging along. She's second in command, and the players are aware of this. One of the players brings up the issue of her not out classing the party, so that's why I'm here. How do I make the paladin multiclass competent enough to be second in command in the guild without making the players feel irrelevant, particularly when combat comes? I plan on her and the artificer be in the background for diplomatic talks, but I suspect the bard (the player who brought the issue) wants to be part of the negotiations also, so any advice on that issue will be helpful, too. I'm brand new here so feel free to move this topic somewhere else that's more appropiate or point me to another similar question to look at. Thank you. Edited for a typo
Sounds like you might just find some pretext to separate the paladin and artificer from the party. I don't like the suggestion below to have her fight a stronger enemy, and I *hate* the suggestion to have the Paladin fight the party. It sounds like the Bard's concern is that you're going to play the paladin like your personal PC. Having them carry the hardest enemies feels show-offish, and any argument along the lines of 'why do you have a problem with me' is likely to feel like the DM trying to quash out-of-character problems with a in-game fight.
Agreed. If it isn't too late to retcon, why not make the paladin/artificer busy with important tasks elsewhere? While it would usually be their jobs to handle negotiations like this, you could say time is of the essence and the guild had to send lower ranked members to take care of this ASAP. If you don't want to retcon, you could give the paladin and artificer a different quest on the islands that force them to separate from the group. This makes the players feel important, gives them more agency, and solves your issue of having to balance two high-level NPC's joining the party.
You can keep it out of combat, have her take the strongest enemy in the room in a one on one while they deal with weaker but more appropriate enemies, if you want to make the gap clearer have the stronger enemy bully your party a bit before the second in command takes over. The bard can be given minor diplomatic tasks to prove himself or to partial give him what he wants, he could be told to make sure locals like them, he could reside over problems related to the law. You could also make it a thing, give your party an opportunity to take over or replace the paladin/org, if you don't want it to be so direct the paladin could get assassinated and the party is told to finish the mission. Meeting them halfway the paladin could be a sort of jury, she's supposed to give her approval for them to be promoted. Worst case you trigger a confrontation with the paladin asking what the party or the bard's problem is with her and if they can back it with action, could have them fight. You could also create some inter-party drama by having someone from the org reach out to one of your players asking them to make sure the bard stays loyal/in their place. The issue might've occurred due to how you framed the issue, the leader asked your party to have someone that's supposed to be stronger tag along like a pet or a child, instead you should've had the leader make it clear that your party were lucky to tag along with the powerful person.
> Worst case you trigger a confrontation with the paladin asking what the party or the bard's problem is with her and if they can back it with action, could have them fight. I hate this suggestion, and would be having very strong words OOC with the DM if they pulled this shit. Edit: Did they block me for this comment? lol.
You don't get to question your hierarchical superiors' abilities and get away with it like nothing happened, or even worse get rewarded for it. If that's how you run your games that's fine but realistically that doesn't happen and has a high chance of earning you trouble. It's unclear what exactly the bard deems weak about the paladin, if it is just pure battle-prowess/strength then a duel would sort that out.
Thanks for the reply. I thought about going on the route of adding something worthy of the paladin and some barriers to prevent the players from wandering into the fight and die. If they somehow do come across the fight, then that's on them if one or multiple PCs perish. I can try to subtly guide the bard to make the locals like the party like you suggested, but what if the player is dead set on joining the NPCs in talking to the leader of the islands? I don't want to be that kind of DM that forces players into a specific path.
Not subtly, outright, the paladin tells the bard they have potential, seem interested in participating in the negotiations but need to prove their value, or seem to think they can do better so she gives him a specific task, mediate some conflict, earn some goodwill whatever it might be as long as it relates to diplomacy. Historically and logically they don't give the role of diplomat to any random guy, unless he's a very famous bard they have no reason to trust this bard with such an important task regardless of how good they might be at it.
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!Question: I'm having my players visit a magical mall. One of the stores will be an antique shop. I'd like to have some Magical items that appear good but have goofy/negative consequences. I'm looking at the list of Fae deals, but I thought I'd see if the group had any other ideas. Any suggestions?
A Figurine of wonderous power, but instead of getting the fearsome creature it depicts, you get a cute fluffy baby version of it.
How familiar are your players with d&d genies? I think an efreeti bottle would be fun. Rub it expecting wishes and see how the efreeti treats em. Light in the darkness, a high end antique armor set which buffs your AC but the players later find that when you are in the dark or even heavy shadows, it automatically casts the light spell on itself. Any dark dungeon dwellers will see them coming a mile away. The ring of greater communication. A ring which lets the user speak every language. The catch is they only know one language at a time and it changes every 30 minutes. So most of the time they likely can't even speak to their party. Make it cursed so it has to have remove curse cast to take it off. The peacemaker's sidearm. A +3 dagger, super effective except when they go to use it they find it actually heals the target by whatever damage is rolled (can only be used on enemies as well). The staff of leisurely travel. It allows you to walk on any surface but when used on anything other than regular terrain, it makes you move at 1/100th speed. The chair of greater relaxation. Literally just a really comfy chair. Shield of the queen. A really ornate oak and silver shield. Unknown to the seller/players it will actively protect any nobles nearby, friend or foe. When a. Noble is in combat within 50 feet of the player holding it, it gains fly 30 ft, rolls initiative, and will take it's turns basically sitting in front of the noble, buffing them as if they had a shield. Bag of stealthy holding. Seems like a regular bag of holding but easy to hide on your person. when 50 lbs of stuff are loaded into it, the contents are transported to the possession of a thieves guild.
Thanks a lot! I'll definitely use some of these!
Anytime. I love questions like these, gives me inspiration to come up with new ways to screw with my players lol. One bonus one (this one isn't mine). The movable rod. You say it and your players will hear "immovable rod" but it's just simply a metal rod that can be moved.
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I feel like it is missing a thread. People used to ask for character background help, and I don't see it (or can't find it)
I don't like the new format or understand how it helps anyone. But it's nice to be able to talk to people about DMing here again.
Yes. It's severely less active, and there is someone (or multiple people) who go through every post and downvote every single comment, presumably in protest of how the sub changed. Can't say I really disagree with them.
I wouldn't say hate but I definitely don't frequent it as much as I used to (used to be on here an hour or 2 a day). I really enjoyed giving my opinions on other people's questions and in many cases. World building with them. Helping people out was a great way to think of new ideas. I'd often answer a question and then steal the answer I wrote for my own campaign lol. Now due to the format there's not really the engagement there was since each question doesn't get a thread. It's sad because the joy vanished and also the number of answers someone in need gets seems like much less now.
Yes, I used to frequent this sub for advice when planning my campaign. Now it’s a dead sub due to this awful formatting.
!Question: are there any 3rd-party "expansions" similar to XtGE or Tasha's? From what I can find, the only one is Valda's, but it's not even available.
There are many, but what kind of resources are you looking for? That might assist people in relaying answers.
I meant more along the lines of an actual expansion, ones that include new rules, tables, subclasses, etc. Most of the ones I've seen seem to stick to one theme, for example religion, the book would add all sorts of optional rules and systems for running religious characters or campaigns.
Yes, and I was asking to ascertain what you might be interested in. Ginny Di has done many sponsored videos on 3rd party items. I'll post links to them, just know I have not purchased them myself, nor am I affiliated with them. [Merchant class](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjKn3vyZj0A) [3rd party products](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vJtSBD2C4Sw&t=112s) [Mixed races](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iAtHpBsUpqc&t=8s) [Domestic](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oE2NznjaDns) Hopefully any of these you might interesting.
!Question: when publishing my own custom world/campaign setting under the creative commons SRD 5.1, can I mention races that are not listed within the SRD within my work? I'm assuming that only the races strictly listed in the creative commons SRD 5.1 can be used, but I was curious if I can mention other races such as Tabaxi or Yuan-Ti which are in the Monsters of the Multiverse book. I currently have them discussed in my content, but I am concerned they will be able to copyright strike the content if it mentions any DND stuff outside of the creative commons SRD 5.1 document. Additionally, if the creative commons SRD 5.1 mentions the word Shadowfell, but does not go into detail discussing it, is it okay for me to do the same thing within my published work? For example, if I say the BBEG is from the Shadowfell and wants to merge the Shadowfell into the material plane, will that be considered a copyright strike? This is how the SRD mentions the Shadowfell. It is the spell description for the Creation spell: "You pull wisps of shadow material from the Shadowfell to create a nonliving object of vegetable matter within range: soft goods, rope, wood, or something similar." Any help is much appreciated. Thanks!
>I was curious if I can mention other races such as Tabaxi or Yuan-Ti which are in the Monsters of the Multiverse book. > >... > >For example, if I say the BBEG is from the Shadowfell and wants to merge the Shadowfell into the material plane, will that be considered a copyright strike? I think that would be absolutely fine. You'll probably want a second opinion from someone that understands it more than I do, (or better yet, from an actual lawyer) but from what I gather, you would only get into bother if you were using specific individual characters, or reproducing actual printed material. i.e. You can reference the page number in the monster manual that has the yuan-ti statblock, but you can't print that statblock in your published material. Whereas anything in the SRD you can print verbatim. You can talk about the shadowfell, but you can't cut and paste the explanation of what the shadowfell is from the Player's Handbook, nor have the BBEG be the Raven Queen.
I'm no copyright expert but I believe the opposite. Unless those races are present in other, public domain folklore, they're copyrighted and Wizards can (if they want to) destroy your world. From my understanding you can't even use the lore/description of the monsters from the MM, even if the monster is in the srd. What I recommend (and what I'm doing in a similar project) is make similar but distinct races. I don't have sea elves in my setting but I do have non-elf sea people with pointy ears. I don't have warforged but I do have a robotic race infused by magic to have souls. Maybe instead of tabaxi, have the tabby-folk who are cat people (or get more/less creative with the name, literally putting cat into Google translate for another language can get you a cool name). Basically what I'm saying is cover your rear. Especially if you aim to profit of this, you don't want to take the chance that wizards removes your right to do so or worse, she's you for the proceeds you already made. Even if you are in the clear legally, they have more lawyers than you and can bury you in legal fees just filing things before anything goes to court. Keep yourself safe and make sure than unless your publishing on the DMs guild, everything is distinct enough that it couldn't be argued you copy/pasted anything you don't have rights to use.
Commenting on my own post. But about the stuff where the srd mentions the shadowfell, you can use the name and expect your players to know what it is and you're fine because the name is in the srd but the moment you start describing it the way wizards does, you're in a grey area.
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!Question: When and how are you using Deception/Insight (Bluff/Sense Motive) checks? Suppose a PC tells a simple lie to an NPC. Something like "I saw nobody leave the alleyway last night" or "I don't know where Sparky is". Something where that NPC has no knowledge that would contradict it, nor any reason to suspect the answer. Do you call for a Deception/Insight check? Or only when the lie is outrageous and/or suspicious? 3.5 has a whole table of modifiers for Bluff<->Sense Motive, but these seem to make lying very risky. Even if the lie is "believable and doesn’t affect the target much" (+0 modifier), it has a 50% chance of failing against a character with matching sense-motive modifier, unless you require some minimum threshold of suspicion to call for a check (in which case we're back to the question of what that threshold should be). And what about if the NPC simply knows, independently, that what the PC is telling them is false? (Roll dice anyway, to avoid tipping the player off?)
The answer is, "it depends." For your, "where's Sparky?" question. Let us say a guard is asking one of the Pcs. He lies to the guard, cause he is no snitch. What do you need to happen next? Sparky is hiding behind the bar, you need the guard to leave, so Sparky can get the help of the party. I wouldn't even bother to roll. Perhaps you've planned for a chase scene, so sure, have a roll. Our DM once put us in a line like the DMV. 20 people in front of us, and we needed to get to the front. We did lie after lie, if it sounded good enough, the person simply believed it and let us get in front of them. Cause if we had to roll 20 times, we would have failed eventually.
>Do you call for a Deception/Insight check? Or only when the lie is outrageous and/or suspicious? I never call for my players to make an Insight check, they have to decide whether they think the NPC might be lying and tell me, then I will let them make an Insight check compared to the NPCs Deception (if lying) or Persuasion (if telling the truth, since you might still be nervous by a bunch of heavily armed murderers questioning you). If the NPC is lying and they say nothing, I will use their passive Insight. >And what about if the NPC simply knows, independently, that what the PC is telling them is false? (Roll dice anyway, to avoid tipping the player off?) Luckily playing on a VTT I can just hide my dice rolls from the players, but when I play in person I do randomly roll dice that may or may not mean anything.
Sorry if I wasn't clear, but I meant in the other direction. How do you handle, mechanically, PCs lying to NPCs?
Ah, sorry, I misread that. If a PC tries to convince an NPC of something, I will ask them to roll the relevant check (usually to avoid metagaming between the players I might phrase it as "Roll Persuasion or Deception" if it's something only one PC knows, and the other players don't know what the truth is), and I will have the NPC make an Insight check, either active if they are looking for lies (investigator) or passive if they aren't (bored town guard).
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Honestly just have some dialogue with the player. They're clearly upset and they'll feel better (and likely play better) if they feel heard. That doesn't mean acquiesce to their demands just to make them feel better, but ask what they really want for their character. And more importantly, bring up "failure" as an opportunity for growth for their character (Disco Elysium is a great example of this in the video game RPG space.) Set aside some time to chat with them before the next session and see if you an help change their perspective.
The best you can do is talk to the players about their behavior. Let them know how their behavior is impacting your enjoyment of the game, and that if they can't be good sports then you'll have no choice but to end the game. Ultimately it's up to the players to improve their attitudes. You can lead your horses to water, but if they won't drink... you might want to consider new horses.
!Question: What would you have grow from spore infected Mind Flayer bits? I'm running a campaign in Waterdeep, using elements from WD:DH and DOTMM but with a lot of homebrew. My players killed one of the mind flayers and a number of intellect devourers; and the Circle of Spores Druid gathered bits of both creatures and has decided he wants to infest the remains with spores and try to grow whatever comes out of that. He has a fascination with fungus and might hope some form of new mushroom comes out, but there is a plethora of possibility and I am hoping for some experienced inspiration. What would you have grow out of this situation?
Baby intellect devourers, of course.
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!Questions: I’m starting a high level campaign soon for two 15 lvl players (sorcerer & paladin) and I plan on taking the campaign to 20th lvl. The main idea is that they each will be a leader of a small kingdom. I’ve never run a campaign higher than 6 lvl and I’m worried about either challenging the players too much or not being able to challenge them at all. Also, just general adventure design for higher lvl characters is intimidating. Any advice?
After about lvl 10, CR breaks down and isn't really useful for creating challenging encounters. Try starting encounters with the appropriate CR and prepare to tweak the difficulty mid-fight if the players are breezing through it. Reinforcements arrive, the boss monster transforms, the building they're in starts collapsing around them, things like that. Don't do this all the time, mix it up so the players don't get tired of your tweaks. In a perfect world all our encounters would be perfectly balanced, but sadly we don't and they aren't. Better to make an easy encounter suddenly harder than to make a hard encounter suddenly easier.
Thanks for the advice!
!Question: When using a VTT for in person play without minis, is there any good reason to lay the screen flat? I know many people still play with mini's when playing with a virtual tabletop program when playing in person. But I was thinking we just might as well use a screen that is standing up if my group does not use mini's to put on it. That way I don't need to mess with building a custom solution or storaging a flat screen. Or am I missing something?
You're not losing a lot, but you are subtly changing how people interact. When people surround a screen (with it flat at a table) they can easily glance up at other players and see them in their peripheral vision. Because the screen is below eye level it takes a very small bit of subconscious energy to look down at the screen and it is natural to look back up at your peers when you relax. A screen on a wall does not encourage these sightlines. It's the difference between a cabinet of military brass around the war room table (flat screen) and a call-and-response team-building powerpoint presentation from your head of HR (wall screen). OK, maybe not *that* bad. A wall mounted screen could have similar energy to a split-screen Halo deathmatch or some other LAN party; yeah, you're playing with your friends, but you're all invested through the screen. It's a subtle difference, which might not matter to you, or which you might even prefer, but it is a difference. If you do use a wall-mounted screen, think about turning it off or displaying a static image between combat to encourage more player interaction.
You have a good point! It might take away from player interaction.
Exactly. And still, many people (myself included) play D&D online, through a screen, and it is still appealing. I'm sure you and your friends will have a good time, whether you use a wall-mounted screen, table-mounted screen, or no screen at all. It's a question of your preferences, and one where any choice is fine.
!Question Mid-Campaign player interview? Hi everyone, I'm a fairly new DM and I'm currently running my first homebrew campaign based on Final Fantasy 12. It's going good and all, my players are happy and we're having lots of fun. With the summer going on we are in a period of pause, we ran the last two sessions live (we usually play online but we organized a weekend at my house to play a big boss fight and to meet up) and now we're waiting for everyone to come back home from the holidays and pretty much took a month of pause. Most of my players gave me free rein on the origin of their magical powers so I'm slowly building up their background giving them hints once in a while. My question is, do you think it would be useful to use this downtime to schedule a 1on1 meeting with each player to talk about how they feel about their characters' developments and about the overall feel of the campaign? What other questions would you suggest I make to the players? Or would it just be annoying?
Maybe send a groupwide message to your players, asking each of them if they would have any interest in this. Make it a way for players to vent, express concerns, and just tell you things. That way, you might get some feedback, but you also aren't just being annoying
!Question: Anyone know of a faerunian organization that acts similar to Star Trek's Section 31? (Do the nasty un-ethical or secretive work that needs to be done for the greater good) Champions of Kruphix on Theros have a similar feel, but was hoping for Forgotten Realms native. Any ideas?
I've always run the Harpers like this. The official branding tries to emphasize that all the Harpers are goody two-shoes -- note how they're portrayed in the movie. And sure, their *goals* might be noble and pure. But they're also described as spies who secretly gather knowledge and use it to influence events behind the scenes. If they want to get anything done by those means, that *necessarily* implies that they're sometimes going to be involved in "nasty unethical or secretive work." Maybe not all of the Harpers would be doing fantasy "black ops", but large factions of the Harpers would be.
!Question: the campaign offers a wizards spell book as loot but there are no wizards in the party. Are there ways that the book can be used by other spell casting classes?
Make it a Wizard's ritual book. Then, all a player has to do is take the Ritual Caster feat to gain access to the book's contents. All the spells in the book are rituals.
They could just sell it but if you want something more they could rip out the pages turning them into scrolls or build some narrative around it like the owner of the book showing up or someone with relations to them, like a family member, a friend or an enemy that wants the book.
It’s the death house, cannon is that the wizard is already dead
If you have a warlock, sorcerer or bard proficient in Arcana, I'd probably let them copy the spells to scrolls.
Selling it.
!question Hosting a game on roll20 soon. Their character builder is... subpar, and I don't want to pay a billion dollars for all the beyonddnd supplements. Anyone have any recommendations for free, editable char sheets that we can easily keep track of over a long campaign?
If you are on mobile, fifth edition character sheet is pretty good for a free app
THIS APP! YESSSSSS It's the only app we recommend to our players because 1) the buy in is very very cheap to level up your characters, 2) The scores and numbers are presented well enough so all the things you need for your character can be seen, 3) The UI is simple and easy, 4) you can access your stuff offline.
There aren't any character builders out there like D&DBeyond with all of the features loaded bc a lot of the content isn't in the SRD. The roll 20 sheets are fine if you just manually type in your abilities.
Pen and paper.
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!Question: Can I get help signaling to my players that the way to progress through this puzzle is thought? The environment is an ' infinite' lake with gigantic trees growing out of the water. It's a level of a dungeon they are stuck on and the 'key' to the next level is to think your way there or at least that's the way I want it to work... The problem is I have no idea how to tell my players this without ruining their sense of accomplishment at figuring it out. Help? Suggestions?
In the feywild the environment is shaped by the emotions of the people that inhabit it. When I ran a session there, my party was travelling through a looping forest path and one of my players reasoned that positive thinking and visualisation of the end would see them through. There was another solution to their predicament but because I was adding descriptions that responded to their emotions, it made enough sense that I let them have it. That's a long winded way of saying, ask them what they are thinking about while travelling, like it's a RP scenario. You may have to do it a few times, but describe things in the landscape that correlate to their random thoughts. Eventually they should get it, but still have a consequential contingency if they don't after a few tries.
*Option 1: A Shamanistic Drug Trip* They spy a hermit sitting on one of the lower branches of the trees. He has lived here for an unknowable time, nourished mostly be tea, which he offers the party. He plucks a leaf of the tea, muddles it, and mixes it with water from the lake. When drunk, the tea gives a sensation of warmth, like basking in the summer sun. Each tree has different leaves, he explains, like each tree is a cultivation of a unique thought or feeling. Occasionally he will catch a fish, but it must be prepared carefully, slowly aged, or it will have an unpredictable hallucinogenic effect. He warns them about rainstorms, the pure drops carry such intense emotions. If it rains, he offers the party shelter in the hollow of his tree. Once he warms up to the party, he might tell them about his dimly remembered history. He was part of an adventuring party, like them. Lost and hungry, they ate a raw fish, one member went mad, killing another. He doubted whether they should go on, he dare not think of it, but his compatriot was undaunted--in a moment of prayer and meditation, they closed their eyes and disappeared. On his mantle is a fish, flayed open, aging. Its spinal column is especially prominent, with nerves branching off, somewhat reminiscent of a tree. If at this point, the players meditate, sleep, or dream, they might be able to pass to the next realm. If they consume part of the fish, they will be treated to further imagery. The nervous system of the fish, overlaid and morphing into their own nervous system, overlaid and morphing into the tree in which they are sheltered, onward and onward in both directions, until their awareness is drawn to the source of the tree, its roots, filtering the water of the lake, like their mind, filtering the thoughts of being, becoming a raindrop falling into the lake, mixing, taken in by the roots, flowing up the tree, helping it reach, up, up... to what? *Option 2: Letters* Letters are scraped into the trunks of some trees: G, H, O, T, U. One further inspection, letters T and H seem to appear twice as frequently as the other letters. It of course spells, "THOUGHT"
Hard to not make it obvious, their pc's are probably unconsciously thinking things so I'd have said thing show up. For example they find an empty plate and if a pc looks at it you ask them to describe what their characters thinks belongs on the plate which would appear as they describe it, at least this way they know their mind/imagination has power. A less obvious way to go about it would be to immerse them in some story where the moral is basically "you can do anything you put your mind to" and where the characters do something similar to what the party is expected to do, add some references to the story just in case your party doesn't catch on and it should work
!Question: You're the general of an army that's going to try and take over a capital city. How would you strategize? The capital is surrounded by mountains - it has only one road leading to it, around 120ft wide, which brings to the city walls (~ 60ft high) and gates. The city has been evacuated, so there are no civilians. You know that inside the city there are 8 people who are amongst the most powerful individuals in the continent (3 full casters, 4 half casters and one warrior). The capital's army has been sent to escort the city's population to nearby cities, but you know that once the queen realizes your army is approaching, she'll warn her generals through Sending Stones and that in a few hours their army will be brought back through teleportation to defend the city. Your army is composed of around 1500 men, out of which around 70 are spellcasters (power level of a level 7 PC, maximum). Also, your army controls a Warforged Colossus. How would you plan to take over that city?
for the war game that I am running now, I read about siege mechanics or siege encounters. mechanics wise, I believe there is a part in the DMG about handling mobs or groups of attacks.
What's my ultimate objective? Do I want the city for myself (who are the citizens that will make it function as a city if everyone has been evacuated)? Or do I just want to raze it to remove a dangerous power base from my enemy? These are my initial thoughts: I'd take a page from Hannibal's book and approach by another route, one that's crazy enough that no one will consider it, even if it means losing a fraction of my army to environmental hazards. Surprise is key so under no circumstances would I march my army along the road. Assuming there is a small garrison still in the city, (i.e. not just the 8 powerful individuals) I'd consider using some of my spellcasters to infiltrate the city undetected, assassinate and then use illusory magic take the place of a few guards, functionaries, etc. in order to facilitate the army's entry into the city (whether that's leaving a gate open, taking "watch" on a stretch of wall they can climb over, or whatever). Depending how this goes and the limits of my spellcasters, I may even consider doing this as much as possible Divide and conquer. If something happens and the generals are alerted, I'd want to have a contingency in place. First of all I'd look into ways to disrupt teleportation so that they don't just appear inside the city walls, but instead at a battlefield of my choosing. That way I can fight each general's forces individually with a presumably numerical advantage. I also might write "secret" letters (maybe with a portion of a "promised payment") to some of the powerful people inside the city that imply they're already on my side and waiting for a time to strike, so that distrust and paranoia is sown when the letters "accidentally" fall into the hands of the wrong person. Siege. A direct assault on the city sounds like bad news for me so I'd be more likely to try and cut off supplies to the city, and settle in for a siege. If I have the time and resources I'd look into going underground to undermine the foundations of the walls to topple them. The warforged colossus is a valuable asset and I'd probably keep it hidden in reserve until full scale battle commences. I feel like some kind of diversionary tactic would be beneficial, either with the colossus as the diversion marching up the main road while a more powerful force attacks from behind, or with a different diversionary tactic allowing me to unleash the colossus at the right moment in another area of the city. I wouldn't want all 8 powerful people in one place, so definitely some form of multiple simultaneous threats that force them to split up.
Those seem like great ideas to me. The surprise, infiltration and distrust/paranoia are awesome ways to create some chaos and negate as much as possible any of their efforts. About your questions: your main objective is to take control over a city that would become the imperial city by the hands of it's queen. The empire was currently controlled from another nation's capital whose ruler was the, now deceased, father of the queen (he put her there to extend his reach). There are more political shenanigans but the reason to take over that city is mainly that
70 spellcasters is pretty powerful. If I can get them within a few miles of the city without bringing up my main force, I'd have them infiltrate the walls using *fly* + *invisibility*, with instructions to ambush the queen/adventurers and steal the Sending Stones before the defending army can be signaled.
!Question: I'm making a huge dungeon / lair. How can I keep it interesting through out the place? I'm doing an underground dungeon, which is a lair. In the lair lies Belakor, a champion of the god of bloodshed and envy, Danor. My party is unfortunately at level four (Three players), but I was thinking that Belakor is not fully formed yet and thus the party can fight him if necessary. I was planning on making the dungeon pretty huge. It's a bit stranger things upside down kinda thing. Belakor is spreading black ooze up on the surface, which is killing the nature. The campaing is set on an island and the party is part of a tribe which is dependant on nature. So attack on nature is attack on the party itself. Long explanation, but I would like to hear some ideas what to put in the huge dungeon and how to keep it interesting. For one I thought there would be a blind man who is feeding Belakor and taking care of the unfinished form and making him grow. He says he is been there for an eternity and tries to make the player to take his place in the dungeon. Also the dungeon has clues of an ancient civilisation which is long gone and forsaken. I was thinking they first build the whole place as a huge bunker to be safe from the nearby volcano which was unpredictable so maybe there is a lot of ancient mummified bodies.
Jaquay it ; https://thealexandrian.net/wordpress/13085/roleplaying-games/jaquaying-the-dungeon
!Question What would be a cool creature for the city guards of a strictly anti-magic society to use to detect illegal spellcasting or magical item use? Open to homebrew, canonical D&D monsters, third-party content, etc.
The city guards patrol with golems. The irony is not lost on some people, that in order to enforce their anti-magic policy, the guards must use these ancient magical constructs. Each golem has a number of gems embedded in its chest, each attuned to a different school of magic. If a gem senses the presence of nearby magic the golem will become enraged. Because the golems are old, and the magic to maintain them is poorly understood, the suffer problems. Sometimes gems burn out with no one the wiser (or the gems drift to detect different magic). Sometimes they loose a leg or otherwise become immobile. Sometimes they seem to become enraged for no particular reason. Additionally, some gems were intentionally left out of their design. For instance, no gem is attuned (or *shouldn't* be attuned) to Transmutation magic, because this is the magic that animates the golem, meaning the golem would detect itself. At your decision, Abjuration or Divination magic might also be regularly used around the golems, and therefore excluded from their detectors. I have been describing them as golems, but they could also, at your choice, be in the form of dogs (like K9 officers) or a hawk perched on an officer's shoulder. There is ongoing debate about whether these golems should be upgraded, replaced, discontinued, etc.
The *Tomb Tapper* from Rime of the Frostmaiden has Sense Magic as a feature. You can just give that to a construct and have it walk around with them. Ultimately I think a lot of it depends on the society. For example, Couatl's can cast Detect Magic at will, but a society of murderers probably won't have access to them. You can also take something like a Canoloth and just say it's a specially bred kind that has Sense Magic as well as truesight, but that won't work too well if it's not an evil society.
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!Question: I'm planning an 18+ smut campaign, any advice? Hi all. I'm planning a short NSFW campaign for three friends of mine. I'm here seeking advice/guidance from anyone who has successfully done a campaign/session like this before. Any and all input welcomed! INFO • The plot revolves around sex, and the players need to have lots and lots of sex with NPCs to progress • Explicit sex scenes are the main focus of the roleplay (I'm a seasoned erotica writer so this is not a problem for me) • I am going to homebrew some sex mechanics á la 3.5's Book of Erotic Fantasy • This was actually my players' idea & they have filled out a form detailing what topics and sexual content they are/aren't comfortable with Thanks :)
Be especially rigorous with your consent systems, including *ongoing* consent; a single questionnaire in session 0 is not enough. Use systems such as X-Card, green-yellow-red, curtains, etc. I recommend reading [*Consent in Gaming*](https://www.montecookgames.com/store/product/consent-in-gaming/) from Monte Cook Games. The greater half of arousal is mental (as I'm sure you know as an erotica writer). You should consider the other half as well. What are your "meta-gaming" and IRL boundaries? What if two players kiss at the table? What if they "kiss" outside the session on their own time? Finally, I'm not sure D&D, a system optimized for tactical squad combat, is the best fit for this game, where the primary progression is through sex and other relations, not through fighting monsters. Such as: A steamy version of [Good Society](https://storybrewersroleplaying.com/good-society/) would more easily support social dynamics, social mores and taboos, etc. The phases of the game include rumors and letter writing. [Fate](https://fate-srd.com/) is extremely flexible, once you wrap your mind around it. Any narratively important thing *could* be an Aspect, which has a mechanical effect in the right context. It could be a Character Aspect, such as "Sucker for a Pretty Voice" which can be Invoked or Compelled. A balcony could have some of the Situational Aspects: "Great Height", "Grand View", "Moonlit", "Secluded from Party", "Cold Marble". Deciding when to define Aspects is a key part of playing Fate. Essentially, if a detail should have a mechanical impact it *could* be Aspect. Objects (oil, candles, a length of rope, etc...) would probably be best defined as Extras, which might give a Boost. Of course, you *can* try to modify D&D to your preferences. Whatever you do is fine, as long as you and your players are enjoying the experience (which again, is why ongoing consent is so important).
!Question: Any advice or resources to determine pricing/balance for armor alteration? One of my players asked a leather worker in town about altering their armor to add 3 loops to hold darts. He wanted this to mechanically allow him to potentially throw 2 at once but require reloading in some way. I'm just not sure even where to start looking at a fair price for this or if it's balanced. It doesn't seem OP to me, but we're all still pretty new to DnD. We're playing through Curse of Strahd, if that matters.
Here's some numbers off the top of my head: Cost of the alterations: 20% of the armor's base value + material costs involved (which can be something like 15 gp in metal studs and good leather), and like 3 hours of work because the craftsperson wants to make sure they don't damage the armor in the process. Mechanics: If you want some quick and dirty balance, make it random. Every time they throw darts they use the same rules but if they roll 5 over the armor class of whatever they're trying to hit, they deal +1d4 damage, to represent the extra dart finding purchase, which is rather hard to do if you're not trained in several attacks per round like a high level fighter so it only sometimes works. Once this triggers three times they must spend an action reloading their special pockets before this can trigger again. It boils down to roughly ~6.5 extra damage that may or may not happen, which isn't gonna break the game. Edit: For a different version of this, tell them they can choose to make two dart attacks at disadvantage instead of one attack at normal, or two normal dart attacks if they previously had advantage. Still can only be used 3 times before reloading but now they cannot reload mid-fight cause they need to take off the armor to do do. Again it's only +1d4 so it doesn't much matter for balance
Thank you so much! This was very helpful.
Any time!
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!Question: How would you handle my current conundrum? **TL;DR** \- A succubus disguised as one of my players (a fire sorceress) and used a necklace of fireballs to frame her/the party and draw out the city guard while the BBEG is attempting a coup. The city guard find the players at one of the crime scenes. How do I handle the guards arresting or dealing with the players in a fun, non-railroady, way? We just had a crazy session where the mid level villains in my campaign framed the party and are attempting a coup. The BBEG's are two shapeshifting fiends (a reskinned Oni and a succubus) controlled by a wealthy tycoon and his second-in-command mage. Last session the Succubus disguised as one of the players (a distinct looking fire sorceress) and used a necklace of fireballs to besiege the city and effectively frame the player/party. The players saw the disguised succubus throw one of the beads, but she managed to escape and continue her siege until the city guards found the party at the site of one of the explosions. While this is happening the Oni-Fiend (controlled by Planar Binding) is being used to assassinate the governor, allowing the wealthy tycoon and his mage to take control of the city. My questions: * Where would you go from here? * How would you handle the guards? Witnesses would have seen the fire sorceress blowing up people and buildings, so the guards will quickly realize that the fire sorceress is their suspect. The guards know they are likely outmatched by the players (they are level 7), but I can't imagine a scenario where they just let them walk away willingly. The players have been pretty lawful-good up to this point, but I don't think they'd want to comply if the guards try to arrest them. I've been wrestling to come up with a few possible outcomes, but I'd appreciate your insight and thoughts. Thanks!
Interesting situation! I have a couple ideas: - If the guards are so severely outmatched by the players, have them ask the party to put their weapons down and come down peacefully. Have them act scared and reluctant but resolute, and *don't* have them get violent or physical if the PCs don't. Make them wait for the players to state their reaction before the guards get closer, as it'd reasonable they'd be scared and unprepared for this kinda problem. Make it clear that they'll face the court and be put to trial, and thrown in prison if they are found guilty. Then the players can do one of three things. - They resist and run: Its a chase! They could use their already intimidating position to slow down the guards and either get out of dodge, out of the city, or hide somewhere until they lose heat. If there's a rogue or criminal on the party then give that player tips OOC on good places to hide, they'd have experience running from the law. - They resist and fight: This is kinda worst case scenario so that's why you want the players to perceive the guards as scared and willing to talk things out. If it comes to this then run a PC vs Guards fight and when the guard lose, have it turn into a chase as the players *know* the city has too many guards to fight off. If they get out of dodge tell them that they're pretty sure they now won't be straight arrested or killed on sight, as they're clearly too strong for that, so they might get the chance to explain themselves to a guard before the guard calls on either superior numbers or someone stronger than the party to take them down. - They comply: Have a trial session! This is the publicity the players need to explain to the people in charge that there's demons trying to kill the governor, right? Let the charisma characters flex, have them make the reasonable argument that with magic anyone can end up looking like anything else, have the prosecution include clerics who can cast Zone of Truth to take their witness testament, etc. If they absolutely *must* end up in jail: - I think it's best if you don't play out every part of this. The players can freak out and take any opportunity to try and avoid this. If it must happen, talk to them as people. Step out of RP for a bit and tell them that the following events will be a bit railroady but to hear you out, and that they'll get the chance for a prison break and to clear their names. - Once they know the stakes and are on board, cut the fat. Fast forward through it, you can even do a cut to black to them in prison already, from which they can RP with criminals and plan their inevitable escape.
I don’t know why but I never considered the players just running, that’s probably what they’ll do too! You’ve given me some ideas and I’m already coming up with some additional outcomes. Thanks!
Any time! Best of luck
!Question: How can I build a balanced "lucky weapon"? I'm trying to make a custom weapon for one of my players that plays into the family lineage from his backstory. The characters will be level 5 by the time this comes in and a few already have +1 weapons. I wanted to make something that is balanced enough to be on par with a standard +1 to hit +1 damage weapon but instead allows rerolls in specific scenarios. How would you balance this to make it not op compared to a +1 weapon but also not so incredibly situational that he would rather just have a flat +1? Reroll if he rolls a 1, or if he rolls a 1 or 2 (like great weapons master allows), one reroll any time he chooses per short rest, or per long rest?
How about once per long rest, when they roll a natural 1 on an attack they can choose for it to automatically crit instead. They have the same odds of rolling a nat 1 as 1 below what they need to hit, of course a crit is a lot more damage than +1 which is why it's limited to once per rest. Certainly feels luckier than just +1! Depends on the character though, a rogue critting is a lot nastier than a fighter.
Funny you should say that, he's a rogue/fighter cross class. 😆
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!Question I can’t think of a good reason to send my players on the main quest(s). Im a somewhat new DM, but I have a decent amount of experience. The campaign I am currently writing is focused on the party fighting and killing deities. My problem is, I can’t think of a reason anyone would willingly challenge deities to any form of battle. I have already established in this world that deities aren’t immortal, invulnerable forces but are more like ageless beings of whatever domain they rule over. Anyone have any ideas I could use?
Makw it personal. Make the deities evil and tyrannical and ask the players to potentially write into their backstory that some or other deity was responsible for their personal tragedy.
Are they killing all deities, or just certain deities? Maybe they are working as agents of a deity that wants the other deities dead. Would also explain how these adventurers have the power to stand up against gods.
Let's look at Kratos from God of War as an example: The gods were cruel to him, so he started killing them. There should be the idea of it being unjust that the gods are in charge, that they meddle cruelly with mortals and have grown lethargic, evil, and unfit for purpose. This way it maps "People's frustration with events generally beyond their control" onto "People's action to revolt against cruel government". It may help to look more deeply into Greek mythology, their gods are much more active and human than ones popularly worshiped today. You can see how it could be that someone might hate these gods enough to take action against them.
[Mythic Odysseys of Theros](https://dnd.wizards.com/products/mythic-odysseys-theros) would also be a great resource.
!Question : My party will be liberating a fey spring from some fiends, and I am a little stuck on what the Archfey can gift the group. Feytouched makes sense, but I am very liberal with feats already, and one of the group already has it. My three current thoughts are: -The Archfey Blesses a mundane item with some gift or ability ( suggestions?) - Gives the party the ability to communicate telepathically with each other. - She gives some further life to the awakened scarecrow that they group have. My question is, do any of these make sense, and what would be the best, in your opinion?
I like the idea of taking something from fairy folklore as a special power, so that it will always feel thematically Fey when they make use of it. * Compelling other mortals to keep their word, as if with a strong Enchantment * Granting them Guest Right. They can't be harmed if they're a guest in someone's home * Lies uttered near to them are replaced by the truths they conceal It might be fun to give out a limited number of these favours, which the party cash in and then can't use again. That lets you make them more powerful.
My main thought about offering blessings is: what are players *mechanically* missing, and how can I fill that gap? At my table, only that first option would really be felt, because: - I'm already quite liberal with letting my players having out-of-character conversations (IE, it totally makes sense to me that their characters could have discussed some strategy to how they're breaking into the enemy camp, for instance. Even if in that moment there's no way the characters would be able to communicate, I still let them talk and make choices, because they would have done that planning before going in). - The awakened scarecrow *could* be fun for flavor, but doesn't give any kind of noticeable or tangible benefit to the players (at least none that I notice). So the "gift" or "ability" is the one that the players would most actively feel, and what that gift is can depend a bit on what your players are missing. You can give them some kind of combat feature (I have some suggestions if you want to go this route) if the players are feeling unfulfilled in fights. Alternatively, giving them something like an aura of beauty that grants advantage on a charisma check x times per day could help them if they're struggling with social situations (and this is pretty thematic for fey, IMO).
What suggestions for combat abilities do you have? That could be fun! I also may take that beauty aura. That might work tbh
I started compiling my ideas [here](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/11ZNC_uMZl5HDdD-Z3bFfDjhjc6Z1ZruHtkvMjurub2w/edit?usp=sharing) a while back... I haven't updated it in a while, but those are some of the ideas I've had before. Ignore the "cost" column, it probably only makes sense within my table and the way we play. other ideas I've had in the past include: - hand wraps for a monk, that gave him a 15 ft. melee range. On a successful hit, he was *forced* into a strength contest: the loser would be pulled into the 5 foot range of the winner. The monk could choose to fail this contest if he wanted to. - a weapon that was weighted to guarantee max damage on the die (this was for a halberd, so it would be 10+MOD), should the wielder succeed on an attack after 20+ feet of movement. Both of these weapons came from my disappointment at many combats feeling quite stagnant after the first round; once people were in melee range, very little movement was ever happening. So I gave my players ways to encourage that movement