Homebrew your 5th Edition setting - Dungeon Master Tools

Looks pretty darn magical out there.

 In an earlier post, I talked about knowing what type of game Dungeons and Dragons 5th edition was and how understanding that can lead to better games at the table. I gave some example on preparing your sessions using that information.

But what if you want to build a campaign world for a 5th edition home-brew campaign? How do you apply those points?

Here are the points again.

• The player characters are powerful and will only get more powerful.
• The game expects a setting where magic is everywhere and well known and used often.
• Anything can happen and it often does.
• Most of the rules in the game revolve around combat with monsters and how to resolve it.

While you often see the default setting for Dungeons and Dragons as medieval European inspired. That familiar trope can clash with the way the game is currently played. For me the disconnect is very strong. It can be difficult to reconcile medieval castles and knights dealing with flying player characters that look like cat people who can shoot lances of fire from their fingertips while strumming a lute. It gets comical and silly really damn quick. And if you are going for a comical game, then it works great. But if you are more interested in running a serious game, then it can be a challenge.

If you look beyond the classic Forgotten Realms setting and at some of the other campaign settings for 5th Edition from Wizards of the Coast you see some appealing alternatives. A lot of folks love the Eberonn setting, with its pulp noire aesthetic and fusion of magic and technology. 

Had a blast in this setting!

I ran a year long campaign in the Ravnica setting, based on a high magic super-city from the Magic: The Gathering card game. This was a blast, and the high magic/high power of 5th edition fit easily into the setting. It also allows for lots of intrigues and crazy combat situations. 

Spelljammer with its interplanetary travel, Planescape with its dimensional hopping and Theros with its divine powered characters and destinies can all work with the bigger scope that fits 5th edition. I haven't had a chance to take a look at it, but the setting of the Radiant Citadel, from the adventure anthology Journeys through the Radiant Citadel looks like a good fit and with an all new setting created specifically for this edition. 

So look at these settings for inspiration for your home-brew. For me, a lot of the powers and spells could also easily fit in fantasy worlds found in anime and Japanese role playing games like Final Fantasy. In my mind, the further you pull away from a grounded historical setting and open up an imaginative large scale world, the better the fit for this edition of the game.

So let's ask a couple of world building questions that will help you create a world for your 5th edition campaign.

• Why is your setting so magical - what caused it to be that way?
• What kind of threat are you presenting that will take super heroes to resolve?
• If magic is everywhere and nearly everyone can access it, what keeps everyone from being a super hero?

Coming to grips with those three questions will help you create a campaign that can build up to higher levels of play. If there is one thing that Dungeons and Dragons players love - it is leveling up. It also answers some basic questions about the world that your players may find useful during character creation and backstory development.

Worldbuilding can be a lot of fun, and a whole rabbit hole of work if you aren't careful. So remember, that you are creating a setting for your players to explore and interact with. Keeping that player focus helps you stay on target and only create what you need for your game first. And then, if you have time, you can flesh out more just for fun.

A violent argument broke out over whose day was more magical.

Know your system - Dungeon Master Tools

The player's handbook compels you!

 I've been playing Dungeons and Dragons 5th edition for several years now.  I've came to the realization that this game has a very specific style it is going for. Understanding that helps me prep and run my games in a way that works for me and the players.

This seems like obvious advice, but I can't tell you how much I've struggled against what 5th edition is, and what I wanted it to be. It created an odd disconnect that ended up frustrating me, and in one case ended a campaign way too early.

So what is D&D 5th edition at its core? It is a game about super heroic characters in a high fantasy-high magic setting fighting monsters and performing impressive heroic acts.

The game works best when you embrace these key elements:

• The player characters are powerful and will only get more powerful.
• The game expects a setting where magic is everywhere and well known and used often.
• Anything can happen and it often does.
• Most of the rules in the game revolve around combat with monsters and how to resolve it.

Keeping these points in mind while prepping for your next session or building your campaign can lead to more fun at the table and a better experience overall.

Let's look at some examples for making this work.

• Know your player characters - review the spells, abilities, feats, and magic gear they have as part of your prep session. Then build encounters (monsters, traps, NPCs) that allow them to use these cool features. If using a published adventure, modify encounters to highlight these elements. 
• After hitting level three, and certainly by level five, most players characters are very powerful. You can toss a lot at them, and they will survive. Embrace this instead of fighting against it. The bigger threats and overcoming them are part of the fun.
• Most 5th edition settings are full of magic and magical mayhem. This means that you can play around with all kinds of storylines and elements including time travel, dimension hopping, encountering gods (or god like beings) and more. The scope for a 5th edition campaign can be HUGE, and leaning into that gives the players a sense of achieving important and amazing tasks.
• Combat is a big part of the game. As much fun as roleplaying and exploring are, combat is where the characters shine. So spend a bit of time giving your combat encounters a bit of flavor, with memorable monsters, or an interesting environment, or an element of added tension. Don't go overboard with combat, but keep in mind it is a key element of the game.

If they are level 7, they've got this.

Game Log: Shemshime's Bedtime Rhyme

In my previous article I provided some tips for running Shemshime’s Bedtime Rhyme from Candlekeep Mysteries. Most of those tips came from running the game myself. We had a good time overall, but I was hoping for a smash success with this one. I love horror as a genre, and while I’ve been incorporating horror elements in my 5^th edition campaigns, this was the first full horror scenario I’ve had the pleasure of running. In this article I’ll describe what I did, and where I could have done things a bit differently.

 

Candlekeep looms over the Sword Coast.

I ran this online over three sessions. The first two were about three and half hours long and the last was about two hours. 9 hours total with five players. They were playing new characters for this little side adventure from our weekly Ravnica campaign.

 

Summary: The characters arrive at Candlekeep in the night and are sent to a cellar beneath the inn (which is full). Once there they meet a group of NPCs and explore this hidden portion of the library. In the morning, they awaken to a tune playing in their head non-stop. The NPC in charge seals the cellar after sending out a message for help. She reveals that the tune is an ancient curse that afflicted the library once before. As the curse continues to manifest, NPCs start to lose their minds, violence erupts and something sinister becomes more and more powerful. Eventually the PCs discover source of the curse, and are given a hint or two on how to stop it. The finale is spent trying to finish off the malevolent being Shemshime, and breaking the curse.

 

My first big change would occur before we even start playing. Setting expectations. I told my players that this was “more of a horror adventure than a mystery”. But I really should have just said, “This is a horror adventure. Your goal is to survive long enough to break a curse.” Nearly all my players created investigators of some kind. As such, they didn’t really get to use their skills and abilities that much. This led to some frustration from them, because half of their stuff wasn’t super useful. To be fair, this adventure can work with pretty much any character group. That said, their expectation was to be able to use mystery solving skills to help them in this adventure. But those skills aren’t really vital to survive the scenario.

 

This expectation also made the resolution of the “mystery” of why this was happening feel unsatisfying. One player actually said, “I don’t know what to do, because it feels like we aren’t finding any clues”. And no, they weren’t finding anything, I was handing them clues when I needed them to find them. As I mentioned in the other article, this adventure is on rails, like a house of horrors carnival ride. For a real mystery, the players need to time to search, to put pieces together, to follow up leads. Now you could restructure Shemshime’s Bedtime Rhyme to play out like a classic locked room mystery. But you need to put in some extra work to do that. To really run this right from the book, it is better to make sure your players know this is a horror adventure to enjoy as an experience, not a mystery to be solved.

 

Creepy drawing by a child. Always fun.

Finally establishing this was a horror game, I should have found out what kind of horror the group wanted. I didn’t ask if they were good with evil children or harm to children. So when little Gailby was in the spotlight, I wasn’t sure how far I could or should go with her character. My players liked most of the NPCs so I ended up pulling my punches when it came to violence toward them. And some player characters were never in actual peril. The main bit of feedback I got at the end was that the scenario wasn’t scary enough. They wanted more thrills, more peril. Not necessarily more blood (because I had one player who said “I’m a weenie and get grossed out easily”). But if I knew their comfort level with scary/imperiled children and that they wanted more spooky scares, I could have adjusted things to hit that mark. I also should have been very clear that a Total Party Kill (TPK) was a very possible end for this scenario. That way, I wouldn’t feel like I had to pull punches at the end, or worse drag things out into a third session. In the end they wanted “more Hellraiser and less Hocus Pocus”. I delivered somewhere in the middle and it didn’t satisfy anyone.

 

With that in mind, I had planned to only run two sessions for Shemshime’s Bedtime Rhyme. I should have stuck to that with all my might, because the momentum of this scenario really flagged with the third session. We have a hard end time, and we ended mid-fight with Shemshime. Yeah, don’t do that! It sucked. In my previous article I outlined the optimal way I should have run the adventure. What I did instead was spend way too much time with the set up and then tried to work in all the Events. 

 

Would you trust old Krinkle?

Knowing that the players wanted a bit more Hellraiser in the game, I would have started session two with the Puppets event, and had the NPCs go all out in trying to harm the player characters. Stakes would have been high, because the players liked the NPCs, and I could have even added some flying books adding chaos to the situation. A good strong start for session two.

 

From there we could have jumped into finding the book must faster. Instead, I let them spend way too much time trying to find the book and looking for clues, and just slowing everything down, instead of keeping it fast moving and fun. We did hit all the events. And the discovery of the singing skull was a great macabre moment. But It isn’t really necessary. I could have had possessed NPCs start shouting “Finish the Rhyme!” or have them find that scrawled in a book that falls during the chaos of the Puppets event. Lots of ways to do it.

 

Now my favorite bit of tabletop roleplaying games is the character interaction. As a player, I’m definitely an actor type with a bit of storyteller thrown in. As a DM I love the stories we make together, and that means having NPCs that I love playing. I tweaked my NPCs a bit for this game. I did my best to have each NPC find something interesting about a player character, and share a nice moment with them. This means I altered some personalities here and there, and adjusted some NPC motivations or backstories. But it was worth it. If I ask my players about this session a few months from now, I think they will remember the NPCs and the Shemshime being invincible. 

 

However, my strength as a DM is also my weakness. I love creating and playing NPCs. But I also overindulge in social interactions. In a long running campaign it isn’t so bad, if the players are also really into it. My players are, and we can have a few sessions without combat and only social and exploration events. But in a short scenario, this is not good. Once I get the players connected to the NPCs, then I need to really lighten up on the social interactions and ramp up the scares and thrills. I dropped the ball here. 

 

Welcome to the Cellar.

The set up took almost the entire first session. Now, they were all playing new characters who had not met before, so there was the good old fashioned awkward player character introductions. But I anticipated that, and we moved through them as quickly as possible. But I did spend too much time with the grand tour of all three levels of the cellar, and meeting the NPCs. I realized this when I hadn’t hit the quarantine mark by the break in session one. What I should have done was have the remaining NPCs all be in the main floor to meet at once. Instead, I sprinkled them throughout the cellar and just slowing things down meeting all of them. I did accelerate events a bit, and we ended with the fireflies going dark right before the shadows attack. Not a bad way to end things.

 

However, we started session two with a fight, and that ate up a bit of time. Then I tried to cram in all three middle events (Singing Skull, Escape Attempt, Puppets). It was too much. Add to that the confusion of the party searching for clues that aren’t really there to be found. I drip feeding them secrets as described in the events. It felt awkward and a bit frustrating. When they finally found the book and figured out how to repair it, I gave them a little time to plan… and then a little more time… and then a little more time. I should have just said, “we are ending tonight, so let’s just go with the plan you’ve got.”  I must say the in-character discussion was a blast, and I was having a lot of fun having the NPCs chime in with bad advice and distractions. But I really should have just backed off and stayed locked into our end time.

 

They started the Shemshime battle with only about 20 minutes of game time left. And things did not go as they hoped. But they were inching toward the correct resolution. Again, I should have either let their original plan work (or partially work), or just leaned into the horror of Shemshime wiping the floor with them. But because I didn’t set that expectation, I wasn’t sure how comfortable they would be with a TPK ending. I ended up stopping the game at our set end time, and said we’d finish the adventure next session. 

 

When the third session rolled around, I could tell the players just weren’t as engaged. They shifted strategies a few more time and then finally destroyed Shemshime. I did an epilogue scene and actually stretched that out a bit so we didn’t end super early, but that just made the finale feel even more sloggy. The session ended with a bit of shrug, when it should have been a cheer of victory or a bunch of laughter at getting wiped out. 

 

Music from the book sets the mood.

One last thing that happened that was no one’s fault, but that ended up impacting session one was that none of my music was working on Discord. I didn’t have a backup solution, and so the session played in silence. Normally not a huge deal, but with a scenario so focused on the musical rhyme, I spent a ton of work on the playlists and timing for implementing them. Because the first session was silent, all that establishing mood was lost. I really should have had a backup ready to go, even a Youtube playlist for individual players to run on their side to build that atmosphere. I will say that when the music did work on Discord for Session 2 and 3 my players loved it. 

 

Looking at this long ass article you might think that this mini-campaign was a failure. But it really wasn’t. Everyone had fun. They made great and memorable characters. Each of them said they would love to play these characters again. They liked the NPCs. They liked the set up and scenario of the curse. It was a nice break from our regular campaign and was a lot of fun to prep and run. 

 

But hindsight is 20/20. I could have run Shemshime’s Bedtime Rhyme in a way that was more fun, and memorable. It really hammered home how important expectations are to a new game. I don’t think a session 0 is needed for something like this. But if I had been clear this being a horror thrill ride, we all could have embraced it, and really made something we’ll talk about years later.

Tips for running Shemshime's Bedtime Rhyme

I ran Shemshime’s Bedtime Rhyme from the Candlekeep Mysteries adventure book. I learned quite a few things from running it. I figured I’d share them with you, to give you a hand running your game.

Let the investigation begin... in another adventure.

I ran this online over three sessions. The first two were about three and half hours long and the last was about two hours. 9 hours total with five players. They were playing new characters for this little side adventure from our weekly Ravnica campaign.

 

Summary: The characters arrive at Candlekeep in the night and are sent to a cellar beneath the inn (which is full). Once there they meet a group of NPCs and explore this hidden portion of the library. In the morning, they awaken to a tune playing in their head non-stop. The NPC in charge seals the cellar after sending out a message for help. She reveals that the tune is an ancient curse that afflicted the library once before. As the curse continues to manifest, NPCs start to lose their minds, violence erupts and something sinister becomes more and more powerful. Eventually the PCs discover source of the curse, and are given a hint or two on how to stop it. The finale is spent trying to finish off the malevolent being Shemshime, and breaking the curse.

 

Here are a few things I learned.

 

Shemshime’s Midnight Rhyme is a horror adventure, pure and simple. The mystery portion of the game is actually very limited in scope. To be honest this scenario plays out more like a ride through a house of horrors. The characters sit in their seats and the DM takes them through scare to scare until they get to the finale where their big decision is how to finish Shemshime (if they figure it out). Make this clear to the players. They are not here to solve a mystery. They are here to survive a curse. This should help them focus less on the “why is this happening” to more of “how do we stop it”. 

 

Tied to this, find out how horrific your players want this to run. You can adjust the horror dials pretty easily on this scenario. If they are hard core horror fans and want more gore and scares, use the NPCs as the punching bags. It is very hard to scare players with character death in D&D 5^th edition. But if make your NPCs likable and engaging, then hurting them or having them hurt each other can really make things horrifying. I mean you have a child and her father as NPCs. Possessed children make for a great moral quandary, but only if the players are OK with that. 

Isn't little Gailby cute?

 

You may have a group that doesn’t want to see children come to harm, or isn’t really into gore. Then stick to the atmospheric spooks and scares. Lean into the creeping darkness, and the shadow attacks (even at this level, shadow attacks against physically weak characters can be scary with their strength drain to death ability). Have the floating books and freezing rooms make a bigger punch (maybe even creating condition affects like exhaustion). Create your own mind-bending scares. Suddenly the passages and stairs in the cellar don’t lead to where they are supposed to. Add voices calling to them in the darkness or add ghostly figures of the unfortunates who were killed by the curse before. To paraphrase my players, find out what kind of horror game they are looking for. Are they feeling more like Hocus Pocus or Hellraiser?

 

This adventure has moments that force player characters to attack other players characters, and it can get deadly very quickly. It also takes away player agency and some players hate that. Before running this game, make sure your players are good with this. If they aren’t, then lean into the NPCs, most are weak and can’t really harm the player characters. But if you make the NPCs likable and relatable, your PCs are going to struggle with hurting them, especially knowing they aren’t in control of their bodies. 

 

This adventure is best when it is kept short and visceral. I don’t think you want this going over two sessions. Break down what needs to happen in the game. Identify your natural breaking points (because they make a good place to stop, or because you can raise tension by pausing there).  Then keep an eye on the time as you run. Do your best to hit those stopping points. Remember it is better to have a shorter session in this case. The longer it goes on, the less intense the game becomes.

 

Here are the key points I identified and where to break for a two-session game.

• Set up – Meet NPCs, explore setting, the curse starts.

  

  Lurking Shemshime

  
  
• Quarantine – Varnyr’s announcement of the quarantine should happen right before your mid-session break.
• Tension moment – atmospheric scare like books moving, room getting cold or firefly behavior 
• Ebder’s Outburst – Characters learn the words to the rhyme
• Tension moment 2 – Shadow attack, finish the battle and describe a downed NPC or strength drained character and end session one.
• Singing Skull or Escape Attempt or Puppets – Start the session with one of these. If your players really bonded with K’Tulah, then the Escape Attempt is a solid one. If they want more of a Hocus Pocus style game, the singing skull is perfectly creepy. If they are more of a Hellraiser group, the Puppets scene can be brutally disturbing. Whichever one you start with, keep the other two in your back pocket in case you need to fill in some more game time. But don’t feel like you have to run them. It is more important that they…
• Find the book – Use NPCs or clues to direct your players to the book. Don’t get bogged down here.
• Book fixed – Shemshime appears at the midsession break.
• Planning – Allow them some time to come up with a plan based on the completed rhyme. If needed remind them that the adventure will end with this session. The longer they take to plan, the less time they have to deal with Shemshime.
• Battle – The players attempt to strike back, and adjust plans as needed. 
• Epilogue – Either a quick scene of the survivors leaving the cellar and getting the reward – or of the Candlekeep wizards finding the corpses of the player characters and NPCs, and a slow pan over to the book looking innocent in a pool of blood. 

 

This scenario features music, which means you really should try to include some kind of audio version of the rhyme. There are a few on YouTube to pick from. My favorite used the lullaby from the film Pan’s Labrynthand shifted the words of the poem slightly to fit. The tune is melancholy and sets a great mood. You can also cobble together a great playlist of music including tracks from the film score, or just play the whole film score to Pan’s Labrynth. This way the background music contains the rhyme as well as having the performed version form YouTube handy. 

Overall keep it fun. It can be tempting to get too dower with horror games. But this scenario isn’t so much a creeping dread story, but a brisk and punchy set of thrills with a terrifying conclusion. When you feel things bogging down too much, throw in another scare. The room gets colder. The books start moving. An NPC suddenly shrieks and runs at a PC with a heavy book. If the players get stuck on how to finish off Shemshime, use the NPCs to guide them, or decide to let whatever idea they did cook up actually work. Remember the “mystery” isn’t the point of this scenario. It is fun scares. If your players end the game frustrated because they didn’t solve the mystery in a satisfactory way then you didn’t set the correct expectations for the game. They should be enjoying the thrill ride, and even if they all get slaughtered by Shemshime, they should end the session laughing and chatting about how awesome the scenario was. 

 

I learned most of these lessons the hard way. Coming up, how I ran the game and what I would do differently.

Dragon of Icespire Peak Campaign Diary - Episode 24 - A Rat in the Toe

 The prep...

Too many rooms, just clip a few.

So my player decided to handle the escort mission to the mine next. I took some suggestions from Bob Worldbuilder and Sly Flourish on this adventure. First off, D.J. Raskin was going to have a bit of knowledge about mining and actually know one of the miners real well. This way he could give my player a few hints (like the mine having multiple entrances) if she got stuck. Also, D.J. knowing one of the miners allowed for some drama to occur when he runs into that miner later in the adventure. 

So I created a new NPC, Volga Runegrog, a female dwarven miner that Raskin knows pretty well. She is leading the group of survivors at the mine and they are holding the rear entrance to the mine. She is focused on killing all the wererats and taking back the mine. I also threw in a turncoat miner working with the were rats (already becoming one of them) to add some additional drama if I need it.

I fleshed out Zeleen a bit more, making her greedy for the golden bell at the shrine and trying to get the characters to clear out the area so her gang can take it for themselves. I also removed the carrion crawler with some striges. It feels like it works a bit better in the hidden cave (and fits the environment the player has experienced already. She knows that striges are in the area).

The final change was to make the mine a bit smaller, with fewer rooms to explore and make it a bit more streamlined for my player to navigate. It will be a nice break from the massive complex of Axeholm, and by removing the empty rooms, I can increase the drama a bit. 

The story...

About that time ol' DJ showed up.

After the recap, I made sure the player had everything she needed from Phandalin, and had all her spells selected for the day. She head over to Barthan's and pulled a strange cold idol of Cthullu from the treasure barrel (yes she rolled that from a trinket roll). She paid one gold piece for it and Barthan was happy to see it gone. 

The Druid and Inverna then met up with D.J. Raskin, former adventurer and excited to hear stories of danger and excitement. As they traveled to the mine, I rolled for the dragon... and he turned out to be hunting in the area they were going. So I had them witness Cryovaine attack an orc and ogre hunting party right in front of them. The took cover as they watched the dragon pick up a howling ogre and then drop him from a height. Then swoop down and blast the area with ice. To wrap up the dragon swooped back down, pried up the frozen ogre and flew away toward Icespire Peak. 

After that excitement, the group continued to the mine, and snuck up on it, expecting trouble. Sadly, Inverna didn't do well with the stealth check, and they were discovered by the were rat guards. The guards were in human form, so they didn't immediately draw suspicion from the player. To present less of a threat, the Druid transformed into an fine horse, and pretended to be Raskin's steed. 

After D.J. mentioned that he was there to check on the miners, the guards got a bit cagey and then said they needed to talk to Zeleen. The party followed the guards back into the cave where they met Zaleen (after noticing the secret knock the rat guards used to get the door to the audience chamber opened). 

Where oh where is my wererat?

This next bit was a bit awkward, since the Druid was in the form of a horse, she couldn't talk. This meant that I had to do some scenes with NPCs talking with each other. Inspired by Bob Worldbuilder's take on the were rat gang, I went full 1940s Noir New York Gangster with the accents, and my player was amused. Zeleen was enchanted with the lovely horse and D.J. chatted with her about where the miners were. I made sure that D.J. collected the information, but didn't make any actual decisions. He kept glancing to Inverna and the horse. Inverna was all about attacking the obviously lying were rats, but the Druid kept her head.

Zeleen wove a tale of her group finding the miners here all dead or dying. And her group tried to help, but it was too late and they all died. But she would give D.J. a nugget of gold for their trouble. No one was buying that story, so with a bit of prodding and the Druid in horse form acting like she really liked Zeleen's attention, the were rat leader mentioned how they were living at the Shrine of Savras. While they were there this half-orc shaman showed up and was ranting about the end of all who opposed him or something stupid like that. They told him to take a hike, and within a week a group of orcs and ogres showed up and drove her folks away from the shrine. She would be happy to leave the mine if they could go back to the shrine. 

D.J. and Inverna told Zaleen they would like a moment to chat. And Zaleen and her buddies left the room. There were essentially two plans. After learning that the ladies had already been the shrine and taken care of most of its denizens, Raskin suggested they return there, finish off the orcs and then come back with proof for Zaleen and maybe get her group out of here without a fight. Inverna was all for attacking now, surprising them and clearing the mine that way. The Druid was still in horse form, but signaled that Raskin's idea was the one she wanted to try. She had already deduced that Zaleen was a wererat (the player figured it out from my description and remembered the ratty evidence from the shrine earlier in the campaign). She rolled a 24 on history and so she remembered a story that were rats could only be harmed by magic or silver weapons. This swayed her decision to try their luck with the orcs.

One of the dangers of Wildshape.

Zaleen was delighted by this and wished them luck, then booted them out of the mine. The group did a quick circuit and saw the other two entrances to the mine as well as the dwarven graveyard. D.J. was dishearten to see so many were killed. I asked if they wanted to investigate either entrance further, but stye decided to keep on the path they were on, and continue to the shrine via Coneyberry. The party traveled up to the shrine, with more tales of being shared among the travelers. D.J. thought they were pulling his leg with stories of the lightening boar attack on Falcon's hunting lodge.

When the party arrived at the Shrine they found more devastation. Earlier in the campaign I rolled for Cryovaine hunting and he attacked the shrine. So here they found more of the walls knocked down, claw damage and bodies of orcs laying scattered around. They also found the impact point of another ogre (probably the one that was high on mushrooms from the previous session). But it was quiet and abandoned.

Now, I rolled for the dragon again... and got the Shrine again. I didn't say anything imagining that Cryovain was nearby, but not visible (in a copse of trees not too far away). The group explored the shrine again, looking for some kind of proof. But then they hit upon an idea. Zaleen kept mentioning the bell during their conversation. The player remembered that the Rogue had noticed that the bell was not all of one metal, she caught the glint of something gold. So using their Immovable Rod, and some rope Inverna climbed the shrine and scraped at the bell. Sure enough it was made of gold but covered in paint to look another color. Raskin mentioned he had some tools to chip away a bit of the bell to bring back as proof. They thought this would be great.

Oh man, I wasn't expecting this.

So all three of them were there on top of the shrine as Raskin started working, and with his tools, he made the bell ring as he tried to pry a chunk off. The noise woke the dragon.

I took a page from Professor Dungeonmaster over at Dungeoncraft, and used a Timer. I rolled a D4 and it landed on 4. I told the player that the dragon would arrive at the shrine in four turns! I determined who had the highest dex and they would act first. It was The Druid, followed by Inverna, followed by Raskin. 

What followed was a great sequence as the Druid used Misty Step to move down from the shrine, got inside and remembered the illusion trap in the alter room. She hurried to it, hoping the illusion would work on a dragon. Since she knew it was there, she got advantage on her wisdom save and was able to enter the room. Invera and Raskin followed (with the chunk of bell pulled free). They left the rope behind but there was nothing for it. They all made it inside the alter room just as Cryovaine landed on the belfry.

His booming voice echoed all around them, taunting them. "You rang the bell to play. I want to play. Come out." I also borrowed from Jurassic Park having him tap one of his claws impatiently against the stone. This quickly became his tick.

The player was at a loss. She was looking through her gear, Inverna's gear and asking what Raskin had on him. I described how Raskin was terrified and not looking like he'd be much help. Inverna was ready to fight the dragon now! The whole time Cryovain is taunting them, asking why they are hiding and clicking his claw. He landed on the ground, attempting to sniff them out.

Moonbeam for fun and profit.

Then the Druid found something in her spell list. Moonbeam doesn't require her to see the target. She asked if she could make a perception check to determine where the dragon was, and then cast Moonbeam on him. That sounded reasonable (Cryovaine wasn't attempting to be quiet). She rolled great on perception and knew exactly where he was. Then she unleashed Moonbeam casting it one level higher to get the damage boost.

Now it was already night when this happened, so the moon was out. I described how the light of the moon concentrated and them struck the dragon. He rolled very high for his Constitution save, but he still took some damage. I rolled an Intelligence check for Cryovaine to determine if he understood that a spell was cast on him. He rolled a 2... so he had no clue. In his mind, the moon was attacking him for no reason.

I had him start shouting in draconic, confused and outraged by this offense. He flew up and landed on the belfry again, yelling at the moon. The Druid just moved the beam back onto him. This time he failed his Constitution save and took a large amount of damage - over 20. Cryovaine cried out in pain, surprised and disturbed by this turn of events. He took to the skies, still shouting at the moon and demanding to know why it betrayed him.

The characters all let out their held breath. D.J. commented that he was going to ask for a transfer out of this crazy place as soon as possible. Inverna cheered the Druid's skills and ingenuity. But the Druid was troubled. That was a dangerously close scrape... how would they deal with Cryovaine when the time came? Did they even have a hope? And that is where we wrapped for the night.

The post...

Shrines are just trouble.

The session started off fine. Heavy role-play with Raskin chatting up his new friends, and then interacting with the were rats. It was fun to have Zeleen become a horse lovin' girl the moment she put eyes on the magnificent "beast". It was also fun seeing my player put together the pieces of the story to realize that the were rats were at the Shrine of Savras originally. 

But I will say the dragon rolls for this session are what made it work. Having Cryovain attack an orc party in front of the player at the start was a stroke of luck. Great foreshadowing that he was hunting in the area. So when he appeared at the end, it felt natural. 

It was great to have the player actually come in direct contact with Cryovaine. I played up his mocking attitude and impatience. I think the player started to hate him just a little bit there. The Timer of the D4 worked great. It felt like it really drove the tension of the dragon coming for them. It would have been crazy if I had rolled a 1, I'm imagining characters jumping down and taking some kind of fall damage. 

But my player is really worried about battling the dragon. Seeing him hunt by picking up and dropping his enemies, and seeing the damage from his attacks close up has really brought it home how dangerous he is. She doesn't have any ranged weapons to really fight him with, but there may be another way.

Smug white dragon?

I know my player, and she likes to have a plan. At this point, she feels like she doesn't have the knowledge to make a plan. So maybe the treasure at the Dragon's Barrow isn't another magic weapon - but knowledge of dragons. Maybe there is another way to impair Cryovaine that will tie directly into her methods as a druid.

She also mentioned that if they could drive him away, that could be an option. I agree. And then I thought of something else. I'm currently reading The Tyranny of Dragons campaign adventure. Maybe I could introduce the dragon cultists from that adventure - and they could help in getting rid of Cryovaine - for a price. More pondering...

I may be going off book for this finale, but I think it may work best for my player. All that said, we had a good time with this session. I'm very curious to see what she comes up with for the next session, and if they find the dwarven miner's holed up on the other side of the mine.

Up Next...

A miner problem.

The Timer - Dungeon Master Tools

Looks harmless, right?

 So I've seen a few recommendations about using a timer during a session before, but I've never tried it. Professor Dungeon Master over at Dungeoncraft swears by them. I recently had a chance to use one while running the adventure Salvage Operation from the Ghost of Saltmarsh adventure book. Guess what, it worked great. It drove up the tension of the finale sequence to impressive levels. I'm certainly going to look to add this to future set piece encounters.

Now you could use an actual timer counting down seconds until something happens. But the timer in Salvage Operation is built right into the encounter. So lets set the scene here. The characters enter a ship floating abandoned on the high seas. They are looking for a heavy box that requires two characters to move. It is at the bottom of the ship. So the characters search the ship, encounter traps and monsters along the way. When the reach the bottom, the hold is partially flooded, but the box is there. 

The moment one of the characters touches the box, all hell breaks loose. A giant octopus attacks the ship and tries to tear it apart. The adventure then breaks down what occurs in the environment round by round. First, tentacles explode into the hull hitting some characters. Next round the ship shifts throwing some of them around. Next round the ship starts to sink. The whole time more tentacles are smashing throughs he hull. The characters are trying to escape and two of them are lugging that heavy box around with them (need to keep it in hand if they want to get paid). Any monsters left on board are trying to escape. And the rowboats out in the water attempt to get closer to save the characters. Each round things get worse as the ship continues to sink and level by level gets flooded with sea water. 

"There are going to be two dead people in here!"

Now this set up is pretty complicated with lots of moving parts (literally and figuratively). But you can keep it simple. There is that scene in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom where Indy and Short Round are trapped in the room with the ceiling and spikes closing in on them. Round by round it gets more frantic as they try different things to get out. Meanwhile Willy is outside of the trap attempting to help. You could easily capture this moment in D&D, with plenty of different elements to keep all the characters engaged in the danger.

Now I wouldn't abuse these timers. I would keep them for key moments in an adventure where it is important to drive up tension or increase the sense of danger. Using these constantly can take away some of the fun they add. 

Dungeons are the obvious place to use them, since you control so much of the environment, and the creatures. But as you can see in Salvage Operation you can do this just about anywhere. 

So the first thing you need to consider is how many rounds you want this to take. The fewer rounds, the more intense the situation. Professor Dungeon Master often rolls a four sided dice and the result is how many rounds will pass before something happens. I used this in a different adventure. A dragon was heading toward the characters and I rolled a D4 to determine how far away he was. I rolled a 4 and the characters scrambled to get off the roof of the shrine and inside before the dragon arrived. That was a blast.

"I did not sign up for this!"

But you can be a bit more structured like Salvage Operation was with each round describing how the stakes got higher and higher with each round. And that can be important, you want each round to get more and more intense. So you can stretch out the danger. You may even want to put a single round where nothing new happens just to give the players a moment to catch up. Salvage Operation has the octopus constantly bombarding the ship, but if the characters attack the tentacles and do enough damage, the octopus stops for a round.

 Last you want to make sure you don't remove choices from your players. You can use the round by round structure as a guide, but if you players figure out a clever way to get around some of the obstacles, then let them do it. The object is to create tension, not railroad the players.

So using timers is a great way to increase the stakes in an encounter or sequence. Try working one into one of your dungeons or set piece encounters the next time you are prepping for the game.

The Initiative Problem - Dungeon Master Tools

And he's running the old school rules too!
We're doomed!

 "Roll for initiative." It's become a meme. It means that it is time for the characters to throw down with some monsters. It means, everything just got more serious.

It also means the game comes to a screeching halt as everyone at the table rolls dice, adds modifiers and the DM tries to put everyone in turn order, display that turn order, and correct any errors that may come up. After all that, you can start the battle. With a group of new players or large group this can take 5 minutes or more. It feels like an element of the game that could be improved.

Keeping Initiative

So let's work within the rules.

Only roll once for each creature type. So if the group is being attacked by 4 mephitis, 2 giant centipedes and a water weird, you are only making three rolls instead of seven. It will be MUCH easier for you to track, especially if you run theater of the mind style. 

Here is one of my biggest time saver suggestions. Take some time during session prep to roll initiative for all the monsters and NPCs that may be involved in the battle. I will include Sidekicks, Retainers, and Henchmen if we are using them. Then when it comes time for the game, no one has to wait for me to roll for all these other characters.

I also use a spreadsheet with the character's names in one column. I plug in their initiative rolls in the column next to it. If I pre-rolled for the monsters, I'll add them in the same way, and then I'll sort the rolls highest to lowest. This is also a great way to track monster armor class, passive perception and hit points, so I have that key information at a glance.

Alternative Initiative

Still love saying "Roll for initiative" but hate all the book keeping and organizing? You can still have the players roll, but keep it simple. Have all of them roll a single 20 sided die, and the highest roll is what the group takes. Or they take turns throughout the session, and just keep track of who last rolled. This can lead to them planning a group what they want to do (don't give them too much time, they are under attack), and lead to some interesting cooperative combats.

Or use the dexterity score as the initiative score for the characters and monsters. This way the players know who is going in what order, and the only question is what the monsters will do. This allows for some planning by the party ahead of time. "We know the monk is going to move first, so let her get into position behind the orc and do some damage. Then the rogue goes next, attacking the same target and getting sweet Sneak Attack damage, oh and we are using flanking rules too, so the Rogue attacks at Advantage!" 

Conclusion

While I enjoy the variety that rolling initiative creates during combat, I'm coming around more and more to something faster and gets us into combat with minimum fiddling. My spreadsheet is super helpful in my online games, but I also like the simplicity of just letting the fastest character move first. It will be something to try out in a one-shot for sure.

What tricks do you use to speed up the initiative process, or do you have an alternate style you use that works great at your table? 

Schools of Magic - Dungeon Master Tools

 

Quick, guess the school!

Here is a Dungeon Master tool that you'll want if you have a wizard in the party... or anyone with the spell Detect Magic on them. This spell allows the caster to detect if an item is magical or has a spell cast upon it. But it also allows the user to determine the school of magic (if any). 

Yeah, the school of magic. Now, typing "school of magic" into D&D beyond will yield all kinds of results, but none of them are actual lists of the school of magic. And for some reason this information is not included on the DM screens. Instead this information can be found in the Player's Handbook in the Spellcasting chapter in a callout box in the Attack Rolls section. I still have no idea why.

There are eight schools of magic in Dungeons and Dragons (but a DM can create their own to add or replace if they wish). Most players who use spell casters do have a knowledge of the eight schools, because that can impact their spell selection depending on what class they are.  Your players will probably expect to hear the names of one of these schools when they cast this spell.

So you need a copy of that list somewhere behind your DM Screen. I use One Note to run my games, and I have a tab for rules and reminders - this list is in there and I can access it easily. If you are running a physical game without electronics, then maybe just print it out and post it on the screen somewhere.

This information isn't just handy for the Detect Magic spell, but also if you need to describe something magical in game, or have a theme for spell types - like enchantment spells always glow blue when cast. In time (like a lot of these helpful reminders) you may end up with these schools memorized, but it doesn't hurt to have the list in a handy place, when the occasion arises.

Schools of Magic

• Abjuration - spells of a protective nature 
• Conjuration - spells move objects and creatures from one location to another
• Divination - spells that reveal information
• Enchantment - spells that impact the minds of others
• Evocation - manipulation of magical energy aka damage dealers aka fireball
• Illusion - spells to deceive the minds and senses of others
• Necromancy - manipulates the energies of life and death
• Transmutation - change the properties of a creature, object or environment

Evocation for the WIN!

Dragon of Icespire Peak Campaign Diary - Episode 21 - Dueling Druids and a BIG Ham

The prep...

When druids attack!

I was excited to prep for the boss battle of Granoc the orc druid vs. the Druid in front of the burning tree at the Woodland Manse. It was a very cinematic set up. I went over Granoc's stats again, and added a few more druidic abilities that I might use, including the spell Lightning Lure and reskinning it to be blood vines that do bludgeoning damage. I got the boar stats ready, since I figured it would be wild shape against wild shape (the player's Druid was already in the Black Bear form). I also prepped the Twig Blights to keep Inverna's sword occupied.

At the end of the Woodland Manse section there are two recommended follow ups you can add. One was to have the boars and anchorites in the pumpkin patch attack the characters as they leave. I knew my party would be pretty beat up and low on resources after the battle against Granoc, so I decided to have the pumpkin patch party run away (and retreat to the Circle of Thunder). But there was a suggestion of having an attack at Falcon's Hunting Lodge. This made perfect sense to me, so I prepped that.

It would be a group of 20 orcs and their giant spirt of thunder - Gornok the Thunder Boar. This thing is scary as all hell, with multiple lightening and thunder based attacks, a whole bunch of hit points and power. Combined with 20 orcs it seemed like this would be deadly. But I reviewed Falcon's stats, and he was pretty damn skilled with that bow, so I figured it might work out if my player decided to defend the Lodge against Gornok and the orc army.

Two many orcs? Make them minions.

I decided to use the minion concept for the orcs. I gave them two hits a piece. So any successful hit against an orc would drop him to half, and a second hit would kill him. A roll of a natural 20 would be an automatic kill. This would keep combat moving faster and be less fiddly for me to track all the HP for each orc. Since Inverna rolls a critical hit on 19 or 20, that gives her better odds for one shotting some of these orcs. I made twenty boxes on a piece of paper and would track the orcs this way. One slash would be one hit and an X would be a death.

I pulled up all the stats on D&D Beyond in separate tabs and was ready to run these two encounters. Let's face it, this session was back to back boss battles.

The story...

Orc druid is about to monologue.

The session opens with Granoc demanding to know of Falcon sent them. Unfortunately the Druid was in Black Bear form and couldn't answer. And Inverna was just in the mood to kill orcs, "Shut yer trap and let's fight!" was the only answer he got. He declared that even if they defeated him, there were two more dedicated to Talos and it was hopeless to fight them. Yeah it was villain monologuing, but my player got a kick out of it and of course noted the fact that there were two orc "bosses" in the area. After completing his classic nemesis rant, he transformed into a boar and attacked. 

The boar has a powerful initial attack when it charges at an opponent, and that did some damage to the Druid who was already injured because of the fight against the vine blights. But she held her Bear form for a while, putting the smackdown on Granoc. Meanwhile the twig blights burst from the Manse, four in total, and swarmed Inverna. They didn't hurt her too much, but it kept her from helping the Druid during her battle.

Eventually the orc shaman was forced out of his boar shape, not once, but twice! He attempted to strike back with his spells, like Thunderwave and even my adapted Bloodline Lure spell. This caused the Druid to fall out of Wild Shape, but she got her quarterstaff all shillelaghed up and continued the beat down. Inverna joined in and Granoc called out to Talos for aid even as he was slain and the tree burned to ash in the well behind him. Victory!

Not exactly the most fashionable.

As I estimated both ladies were beaten up pretty good and low on resources. They completed the search of the Manse, and didn't find any other enemies. They briefly discussed burning the place down, but decided against it. The returned to Falcon's Hunting Lodge. He met with them and they discussed what they found. He gave them the Boots of Elven Kind and thanked them for their help. They decided to stay the night and get a good rest.

Unfortunately the morning brought with it a massive thunderstorm. It was pouring rain and the lightening was fierce. The ladies decided to stay until the storm broke and avoid the mud and rain (and possibly getting lost in the Neverwinter woods). As they were enjoying warm cider by the fire, the stablehand Pel raced in looking for Falcon. The boy saw orcs on the march! The adventurers hurried up the stone tower attached to the Lodge and saw a mass of orcs and something huge behind them, marching toward them. Falcon joined the ladies and explained that they needed to decide now: defend the Lodge or escape.

The héros were in the tower on the
east side of the map.

The Druid pondered this and asked Falcon how skilled he was with the bow. He smiled and said, he's been known to be a fair shot (and she could tell he was attempting to be humble). The trio decided to defend the Lodge. They had little time. Falcon had Corwin and Pel try to wrangle the animals and get them out of the lodge before the orcs arrived. He also told the noble guests to leave. The guests were outraged, "I did not pay for an orc invasion Sir! I demand a refund!" But they fled back to Neverwinter as fast as their horses could carry them.

I told the player that they had to hold off the attack for three rounds. It would be enough to allow Corwin, Pel and the animals to escape the lodge confines. Then the attack began. The trio of heroes use the tower as defense, giving them a +5 to their AC for 2/3 cover. Both Falcon and Inverna had longbows with plenty of range (Falcon firing twice per round). The druid had a mess of spells at her disposal, but knew that orcs were strong and had a high constitution. Entangle wouldn't be nearly as effective against them... but Web would work great once they were in range. Falcon and Inverna rained arrows down on the orcs, who started throwing javelins back at them. 

Then Gorthok the Thunder Boar emerged from the rain, the orcs parted and the giant boar bathed in lightening hurtled toward the palisade. The orcs held their ground using javelins to attack, and waiting for Gorthok to punch through the defenses so they could pour in. As Gorthok hurtled forward, the Druid cast Web on the ground in front of it, guessing correctly that its Dexterity score would be one of it's weaker stats. She guessed right, Gorthok was ensnared by the web and Inverna and Falcon took shots at it. But they quickly realized that normal weapons weren't doing nearly as much damage as they could. 

Elemental boar spirit on the rampage!

The Druid told them to stay focused on whittling down the orcs (they had killed a couple already with Falcon rolling crits a number of times during this battle). She focused her magic attacks on Gorthok. Now the giant boar may be strong but he is not bright. I rolled a Wisdom check and once he broke free he just moved forward into the palisade, but without the running start he did little damage to it. So he turned around and raced back to the orc line to attack again. The Druid cast Moonbeam in his path, so he took magical radiant damage as he charged through it. She then kept moving it on her bonus action and casting Produce Flame at him when he was close enough as an action. She was doing enough damage to the creature to really make a difference. 

Not to say the trio didn't take their own hits. A few times orc javelins managed to hit Falcon and Inverna, and those did hurt. In addition Gorthok got mad at taking so much damage and not managing to crush the pallisade on the first or second collision. He called lightening and it struck. But all the heroes made their dexterity saves and only took half damage. Gorthok kept rolling to recharge that magical attack, but kept failing.

By the time the wall was breached, half the orcs were dead and many were wounded. Gorthok burst into the compound and started bashing things up, still unable to charge his only ranged attack. The Druid moved her Moonbeam directly over the breach so the orcs had to move through it to enter the compound. I kept rolling Wisdom saves to see if any of them would retreat or try to go around. But these guys were so filled with confidence that Gorthok would save them that they ran right at the Moonbeam. Four were killed instantly and the six remaining ones took damage going through, and were easy for Falcon and Inverna to finish off. 

The Druid continued to focus on Gorthok burning him with tiny flames, even as he trashed the compound. Eventually he started ramming into the tower they were in, but it was too little too late. The remaining orcs were killed, so the Moonbeam was moved on top of Gorthok, arrows rained down and he couldn't recharge his attack. The Moonbeam finished him, and with a terrific thunderclap he exploded into a mass of power, shadow and energy. The Druid was disturbed... what was this creature? As soon as Gorthok was destroyed, the rain stopped and the sky above them started to clear. That is where we ended the session.

The post...

Definitely the hero of the siege.

This was a wonderfully fun session, but also a bit exhausting. Back to back boss battles is exhilarating, and the Druid player really handled the whole siege so well. The first battle was a lot of fun with the two druids using their Wild Shapes to defeat each other, and the burning tree as the backdrop made for some fun descriptions. I was tracking the damage for the tree the whole time (telling the player to roll higher and higher damage dice the longer the tree burned). This increased the excitement as the damage numbers got higher and higher. And having the climax of the tree finally being destroyed just as the orc druid perished was a cinematic ending to the Woodland Manse adventure.

I admit right off the bat that I could have played the siege a little harsher. The orcs could have been smarter and climbed over the palisade as Gorthok was attacking and made a run at the characters in the tower. I could have had the pouring rain impact all the ranged attacks. I could have had Gorthok attack the tower immediately upon breaching the pallisade instead of destroying the flimsy barn first. 

But I know my player pretty well. I know what is fun for her, and that this is a game being played to relax and enjoy some adventures. She wants challenge, which this siege certainly delivered. But she also wants to feel like there is some possibility of victory. She never lost hope as a player or character during the siege, and with all the crap the past year threw at us, I love that this game allowed her to hope. So yeah, I fudged things a bit, but she had a blast. She was exhausted but all smiles at the end of that massive battle. Her Druid was the hero who almost single handedly defeated this elemental spirit. She felt like the fantasy hero she wanted to be - that is why we play.

Using the minion rules for the orcs worked perfectly for this encounter. It kept things moving so quickly, and yet never let the orcs feel ineffective. Those javelins hit enough times to remind the player that the orcs were deadly and only the stone walls of the tower were keeping them from getting destroyed. Inverna got real low on hit points after only two javelin hits. Anyway, as a whole this session just flew by, and we played for nearly five hours because it was so much fun. We are both looking forward to the next session.

Up Next...

Stinky Fortress