Dungeons & Dragons - which is now in its fifth edition - is one of the most beloved, most criticized, most played, and most argued-over tabletop RPG systems out there.
Everyone has their own opinion of what “real” D&D is. That’s stupid, because we already have an official example of Real D&D™:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YacKar7y3mc
If you are doing literally anything else, you are doing it wrong.
If you’re not sure about how to craft your own magical carnival ride (what insiders call a “campaign”), don’t look at
the official D&D website, because it’s awful. Instead come to this thread, where millions of experienced Dungeon Masters are ready to give you expert advice on how to do things like:
- Disguise the rails in your campaign so that players will think their choices matter.
- Finally admit that D&D was designed with a grid in mind, and that using one makes combat easier to understand.
- Ignore the rules so that you can create challenging, engaging encounters.
- Figure out a way to make alignment interesting.
- Learn that RP consequences are not a balancing mechanic and never will be.
- Run that pirate-themed campaign you’ve been thinking about for a while that is totally not Pirates of the Caribbean.
- Create your personal interpretation of Jack Sparrow for your friend's pirate campaign.
- Recommend 13th Age or Dungeon World instead of D&D.
- Build a Druid.
- And more!
Posts
I mean, 5E is not a terrible game or anything, it just doesn't really do anything other games don't do better.
Currently DMing: None
Characters
[5e] Dural Melairkyn - AC 18 | HP 40 | Melee +5/1d8+3 | Spell +4/DC 12
@Amaryl
So, in a "recent" game I ran, the players mobilized most of the population of a small town and its outlying farms into a large militia / small army. There were some retired soldiers in the mix, and some caravan guards, and those became "veteran" units. Some of the hunters were skirmishers, they had some older kids / younger teens as slingers, etc.
Each group was made up of 4-5 NPCs. At any time, a PC could attach to an NPC squad and take it over; the NPCs would then follow the players around, provide automatic assists when attacking and potential bonus damage dice, etc. The PC could detach at any time to let the NPCs do their own thing. NPC vs. NPC combat was handled by both sides doing average damage to each other to keep things moving.
I represented the squads with a large mini base that had a colored ring to denote unit type, and a "topper" that represented the group thematically (e.g., an archer for the rangers group, a dwarf fighter-type for the caravan guards, etc.). When the PCs attached, I replaced the topper with the PC's miniature, and they were now a PC leading a gang of NPCs around.
Worked pretty well, I think.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
Our group is looking to start playing D&D. Most of us have played video game versions (baldur's gate, planescape, etc) and listened to podcasts/youtube but we've never run through a tabletop version ourselves. I see that they have a starter set but it looks like it's all pre-generated characters to help folks get used to playing tabletop RPGs. I was thinking we might be past that (I know my friends want to create their own characters). Poking around the official site has quite a bit of stuff, I have some questions if folks could help me understand.
1) Do I need all the handbooks?
2) Is there a resource for story ideas? I see WotC has some 5e story packs for $50, how long do those run? Are they worth it?
3) Watching Acquisitions Incorporated, are miniatures a good idea? Seems like it could get very expensive.
4) Any thoughts around Fantasy Grounds? Seems pretty cool, but is it helpful if everyone is around the table?
5) Any other resources I should look into? Any digital resources that I could load on an ipad or something to help things run smoother?
Thanks for any help!
As for your questions:
1) If you're going to play the game a lot, you would want a player's handbook, and the DM would want the dungeon master's guide and the monster manual.
2) The campaigns they've put out typically run from like level 3-15, they're only worth it if you plan to run them. They vary in quality, and playstyle.
3) Minis and a map are good for a visual, and depending on the types of players you have, they may feel necessary. I consider them mandatory for playing the game in a way that doesn't get annoying fast.
4) Don't use fantasy grounds if everybody is around the table. It's only worth the price for people who have to play remotely, and even then, while it has some cool functionality i'd recommend roll20 over fantasy grounds anyway for long distance games.
5) There are tons of good resources out there. I'll throw a few really useful ones in a post a bit later on, I'm pressed for time at the moment.
That having been said, Sword Coast adventurers guide is a really useful mini-guide to the forgotten realms and has a handful of other character options that are interesting to say the least.
http://kobold.club/fight/#/encounter-builder
This is an encounter builder where you can easily see where a fight falls in the easy->deadly exp thresholds based on your party level and number of PCs. It just does the math for you from the DMG, and since 5E insists on using the obnoxious CR/exp threshold system, it makes life way easier.
http://ephe.github.io/grimoire/
This is just a clean tool that has all the spells for 5E in it, very useful for quick reference instead of searching through a book.
http://fantasygen.herokuapp.com/#/markovChain
Not specific to 5E, but it's a name generator that somebody made and posted recently on the /r/rpg subreddit, and it's pretty fantastic. You can build new generation types on the first tab using the markov chain, or you can just use the stuff that's already on there.
2 more questions,
1) Some of the folks have played tabletop rpg's before, not D&D, I think maybe pathfinder. But they are used to making "colorful" characters or characters with personality. Is that something they can still do with the starter set?
2) I'm probably going to DM the game, any tools or tips for me?
2) Remember the goal isn't to play D&D "properly", it's to have fun with friends. Pay attention to what each person likes/dislikes and try and make sure you cover folks time wise.
Exp threshold relates to how hard a fight is, but is still suitably confusing. Deadly fights(unless they're waaaaay above the threshold) are not at all deadly if a party just came off a long rest and has all their tools to unload like spells and such. If you start playing this game long term, you'll find a "per day" exp threshold that basically tells you how many fights a party should be expected to fight in a single day between long rests. It's about 4-5 medium difficulty encounters, 3ish deadly ones, 6-8 if you sprinkle in some really easy ones. It's not very intuitive, but it does work well enough if you put in the effort.
1) D&D 5 doesn't have a great amount of support for a character's personality. The personality traits/bonds/flaws system is a joke compared to games that really care about this stuff, but as ever with D&D, if your players are adept roleplayers and don't need the system to really support their creativity, they can go nuts and make as colorful a character as they want. The mechanics of D&D are 90% about killing monsters and taking their stuff, as always. Many groups(mine included) have done more with it with the system not giving any help over the years, but it is what it is.
As for the starter set, if you're not going to use the pre-gen characters, you can just use the SRD which has not all but most of the material from the PHB. I think each class has only one archetype, so all fighters are champions, they can't make the eldritch knight or battlemaster when hitting level 3, etc., but the background stuff should be in there.
2) The kobold fight club tool I linked above is super useful for building encounters, but if you plan to use the starter set, you wouldn't need it yet.
Here's a wonderful tool if you have a nonstandard party size running phandelver. It lets you enter how many PCs, what levels they are, and which part of the starter set adventure you're on and tweaks the encounters for you: http://haluz.org/lmop/index.php
Also, for GM help, there are a lot of resources, but if you have the time and inclination, these will make you a better GM, guaranteed:
Being Everything Else:
This is Adam Koebel(co-creator of Dungeon World) and Steven Lumpkin(video game designer and GM for many Rollplay games on the itmejp youtube/twitch) discussing a whole slew of GMing topics.
Running the Game:
Matt Colville, a relative newcomer to the youtube scene but experienced DM and video game writer discussing GMing topics for new GMs, but there's some useful stuff in there for veterans too. This one is pretty specific to D&D so is helpful in that way if you're going to run this game.
The Angry GM: http://theangrygm.com/
The "character" the angry gm uses to write the blog is a parody of one true wayists, and can be annoying at times, but the advice here is phenomenal if you don't mind reading it in the voice of the character.
Regarding CR/EXP thresholds: The base idea for monster level is that a level 1 monster is roughly equal to 4 level 1 players. This system isn't perfect (a dire wolf can put a serious hurt on a level 1 party and the intellect devourer is... yeah), but it's a good way of getting things started.
1) while Some may scoff at 5th as a system for building interesting characters, the background system is fairly clever IMHO; if you go with it as prescribed (two traits, one bond, one flaw) you can get idea's spinning real fast in your head so that Bonk club man becomes Ashla Mason, an enforcer for a local theives guild who is always looking over every new place for valuables, gets pissed off at the smallest insult, refuses to dick over other guild members, uses his stolen loot to help out his family and would rather take the money and run then help out his friends.
2) my suggestion is to start off easy; build a simple encounter (assuming you aren't using published materials) that involves something like having the party fight goblins or bandits at their hide out with a handful of rooms, some loot, a few secrets and maybe a neat thing (minor magic item, suit of armor ect.)
It won't be the most amazing encounter, but it will let you and your players get used to the system and give you an idea for what they want (RP, Tactical battles, puzzles opportunities to min-max ect.) as well as what you want to do as a GM.
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
The only thing I can think to add for you that others haven't covered is that if some of the players have been playing Pathfinder before, then they should pick up D&D 5e pretty quickly, as Pathfinder is a deriviative of an earlier version of D&D. A lot of the mechanics are similar but simplified, making the process a lot quicker and easier to resolve. It doesn't sound like your players are number crunchers so it shouldn't be a big deal.
As for videos and tips for running games, I've enjoyed Matt Mercer's take on it as well, and there is a couple of things I've learned from watching him GM/watching his GM Tips.
Here's a link to his GM Tips as well:
Yeah, the character he writes as can be too abrasive for some readers, and he does get a bit too verbose explaining where he's coming from at times, but his blog has been responsible for some drastic improvements in my GMing.
These are some of my favorite "running your game articles he's written"
http://theangrygm.com/jumping-the-screen-how-to-run-your-first-rpg-session/
That one would be the best first one to read for @Trajan45 since it's about running your first session.
http://theangrygm.com/manage-combat-like-a-dolphin/
This one about how to narrate combat in a way that's greatly descriptive and fun but doesn't waste a lot of time.
http://theangrygm.com/how-to-talk-to-players-the-art-of-narration/
This one about scene narration and transitions, and how you can give great descriptions that aren't reading 5 minutes of box texts like prepublished adventures would lead you to believe you should.
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
The mini-campaign or multiple one-offs is a great way to learn. Let everyone know going into it that its a learning session and you can have lots of fun, and its understood that you'll make mistakes and the players will make mistakes (if they are new to the system especially). When my wife first learned how to run a game I died in the first session (but saved through literal dues ex machina) because she through too hard of an encounter at our level 1 characters. And that's fine. You are going to make mistakes, and its cool. Like he says in the article, if your players are new they are unlikely to notice, and if they are not they are going to cut you some slack (especially if they have GM'ed before). You will learn from the mistakes and will know if this is something you want to do or not.
Also, modules can be fun, and I wish the groups I had played with had not had such a stigma against them so I would have tried them out sooner. As a new GM, more than anything else, it takes the stress off of you. You don't have to create a whole new world and pick out which creatures they are gonna fight, figure out the quest rewards, etc. All you have to do is manage the game and players. I've posted in here a lot about the Curse of Strahd (a horror setting module, a lot of fun but kind of intense for a new group to run through) campaign I'm running, and I've had so much fun not having to calculate out every little thing the players are gonna need to face and create the main antagonists from scratch.
At its most basic if you want to get the feel of the mechanics, run the most basic of encounters; a small group of goblins. Its got the image of the starting adventure built into it, and they are great to fight without being too threatening so the chances of horrible mishap is lower. When I ran my first session of DnD 5e after coming from Pathfinder, it was the very first group of enemies my players fought as well.
Oh! Something I don't remember seeing mentioned, but I feel is going to be very important if you really get into the GM side of it and start creating your own adventures, enemies, encounters, etc., is save everything you make. You never know when you will need it again or might be able to use something you created. You'll find that often players will go one direction when you thought they would go another and so sometimes stuff you build or create might not get used. If you save that encounter, adventure, enemy, or what have you it allows you to pull it up later and tweak it to fit a different circumstance. I have recycled a lot of my own stuff I have created when it didn't fit what was happening, or when I needed to create an enemy and a villain I had created that was similar to what I wanted so I took the base work and changed it. At the very least, you can go over something you created and think back to what worked and didn't work in the encounter or villain you made and take notes from that to try and make your next one better.
The biggest issues my players and I have is not knowing the rules well enough. We usually jump between systems every few months so sometimes the more esoteric rules that come up we don't end up remembering. In the end it usually works out. I mostly favor my players, because they aren't for the most part min/maxers looking to break the game, just folks looking to have fun so if they end up doing something cool that thwarts my plan? More power to em.
An example in the Curse of Straud campaign I'm a player in is that we have a wild mage who has found a suppliment with 10000 effects for wild magic. It's pretty funny and the DM and player have agreed if an effect is too crazy that the DM will veto it and the player will re-roll. So anyways we are in this combat, and it is a tough combat but we are making headway, and the Mage's wild magic goes off, and ends up turning the enemy into a little marble statue. It was great.
Spoilers for specifics
The nicest thing is playing with a group of mostly well adjusted adults. In the 5 years of gaming with most of these folks we've had no big issues at the table. It is goddamn magical. A new couple started playing last year and they've fit right in. I don't know what I'd do if this group fell apart.
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
I think I've had wild surges four times so far. Two of the times they were minor effects that happened near the end of a fight, so it wasn't a big deal. But twice I rolled "cast magic missile as a 5th level spell" and it decided a fight for us.
Still waiting on "fireball centered on yourself." :P
I personally hate the design of the wild mage in 5E, because as it's written wild magic will hardly ever trigger without GM fiat, as the one where you get tides of chaos back in exchange for a guaranteed surge is pure GM fiat, but eh, what can you do.
What you can do is play the chaos mage from 13th Age which handles the unpredictable mage angle perfectly, but this isn't the thread for that.
Our DM rolls a D20 for tides of chaos every time the wild mage has a turn and if he rolls a 1 the tides of chaos triggers. Makes it a lot easier to deal with and removes the DM fiat aspect, which is annoying.
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
Meanwhile, I'm about to go custom create a monster for my next D&D session using angry GM's custom hack for monsters with multiple parts that my PCs can attack with called shots.
Now to start work on a legit dungeon, which we haven't done in a long time, as the party is quite near the ruins of the last elven city in this world, and there's a very eager lich-like ranger ready to drive some adventurers inside and hunt them.
The fight consists of three phases
Phase 1: The Unicorn fights with the normal MM stats, alongside two or three blink dogs that survived the previous fight and two Awakened Trees.
The NPC assists freely in this phase
Phase 2: The unicorn prays to the shrine, filling him with energy but destabilizing the shrine. Nearby players must make a strength save (DC13) to avoid being knocked 10 feet back and prone. On a successful save, players are knocked back 5 feet.
In this phase, the unicorn has more health and can teleport at will, and will do so to allow himself to charge and to summon beasts from the forest for help (example summon: two brown bears). After summoning for help two or three times, his summons will no longer be heeded.
The NPC will move stabilize the shrine, partially removing her from the fight. She can still cast the occasional spell if the party needs the help.
Phase 3: The unicorn will get back up on his turn with low HP and perform a single weakened hoof attack. The party must restrain him while a ritual that stabilizes the shrine is performed. Occasionally, with a one turn warning, knockback shock waves will emanate from the shrine, with a DC13 strength save (though other party members can help with this save), partially disrupting those performing the ritual. The unicorn continues to revive, with more HP and more/stronger attacks each time, but reviving less frequently, with indication that he is taxing himself to the point of death. If the shrine is not stabilized, he will die, which is not an ideal outcome. I need to work out the numbers for this phase
It seems hard, but the party's wrecked almost every encounter I've thrown at them, they'll be fully rested, and there are factors that allow me to do some dynamic difficulty adjustment. Also, if the party's sorcerer thinks it through, he can convert one or both of the Awakened Trees to his side via Suggestion (though he will need to learn the translation of his Suggestion command from his ally, as it has been previously established that these Awakened Trees speak Druidic). He's been itching to use Suggestion on something after a whole adventure of fighting beasts and monsters, and it won't work on the unicorn itself, so hopefully he can figure that one out
I've had some dud encounters in the past, so I'm curious as to what others think
I'd consider if you haven't having the environmental effects work like lair actions, so they occur on initiative 20, just so it's codified and you don't have to arbitrarily remember when to have them trigger.
- Confusion seems good as an AOE disable, though it does require concentration
- Greater Invisibility is probably good, but I think the bard is already planning on taking it, so I don't want to double up
- Ice Storm does less damage than Fireball, but adds a minor terrain control effect for one round. Meh?
- Polymorph probably allows shenanigans, but I don't have a Monster Manual and I don't want to acquire or lug one around
- Wall of Fire seems like a decent damage + terrain control hybrid, requires concentration
- Vitriolic Sphere (EE) is a slightly bigger boom than a Fireball
Are there other good 4th level sorc spells I've discounted? Maybe something from 3rd level I should pick up, and just upsize a Fireball with the 4th level slot?
Then the next day we investigate another location and I sense some undead, again, and charge in, again. I feel bad for railroading the party into these situations but a paladin gotta paladin. If it were anything but undead i'd hang back and have a discussion how to proceed, but...
I like Confusion, you already have a good blast in fireball and I've not as big of a fan as others for Ice Storm. confusion will lead to some fun shenanigans and is a good battlefield control.
I'd take Greater Invis, Wall of Fire, or Polymorph depending on whether you want advantage for an ally's attacks, zone control+damage, or a ton of free stats/HP. If you cast Poly on somebody else and turn them into a T-Rex and just hang back protecting your concentration, it's by far the most powerful 4th level spell.
Greater Invis is both a defensive spell for personal safety and an offensive spell if you cast it on somebody who makes a bunch of attack rolls.
Also, if you've previously had issues with them destroying encounters you expected to be a little harder, go through and pick out a couple of difficulties of backup, and start about where you anticipate needing them, then throw in a stronger/weaker second set based on how they handled the first. If they destroy the first set, and the second set is harder, its just because the response is escalating. If they struggle with the first set, and the second set is easier, its because they've handled the crack team, and now are taking on the second string.
The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson
Steam: Korvalain
I have a question that relates to Banishment. How do fey creatures normally move between planes? Do they do it the same way normal creatures do, by walking through occasionally-opening gates (the DM guide uses a circle of mushrooms as an example of this) or by using spells and portals?
I was reading through the unicorn's spell list and realized he has Dispel Evil and Good, which has a usage that is very similar to Banishment. If he managed to dismiss the pixie NPC, what would she have to do to come back?
Fortunately, I think the fact that the Dismissal use is a melee spell attack allows me to avoid the issue entirely, since the pixie can fly out of reach
The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson
Steam: Korvalain
I haven't run 5e combat, so I can't speak to its speed (or lack thereof), but in general the speed of combat is normally tied directly to the system being used to run it. If that system is relatively simple (one roll, for example) combat is at a pace dictated by THE GROUP because some players will ponder longer on tactical decisions than others, who may take longer to describe actions than others. None of which is bad.
I try to encourage my players to think about the battleground in their head as everyone acts so that when its their turn they have some idea of what they want to do.
But man, blaming everything on the GM with regard to combat speed is just ignorant.