Is there a good 5e character builder out there given Orcpub has been nerfed?
I tried using Wizards' official one until I realized they want me to repurchase everything I already have.
More Purple More Betters character sheet pdf one is pretty solid, but it also only comes with the SRD stuff. It'd be really cool if it could also import a javascript file that had all the other published stuff, like it can due for homebrew, so you could use it to make a non SRD character, but I'm sure no such all_WotC_pub+UA.js file exists on the internet. And if it did, how would someone find something so small on something as vast as the entire internet. There have to be like a googilian different places it could be.
It's unfortunate. You should really go to http://www.reddit.com/r/mpmb to commiserate with like-minded individuals.
Contemplate this on the Tree of Woe
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VizardObserverThe Duke of Ridiculous PoppycockyRegistered Userregular
So I started DM'ing a new campaign set in a alt-America setting post-Civil War, sort of like a Wild West Shadowrun/Deadlands mashup. There's a little Homebrewery document if anyone is interested, but It's mainly just to give the players the gist of the setting so It's super rough (apologies in advance!) https://homebrewery.naturalcrit.com/share/BJ0c66H2M
Here are some inspiration images to get the feel for the setting.
We had our first session today and it went pretty wonderfully!
Party:
Darius, a Black Tortle Barbarian from the Great Dismal Swamp working for the underground Railroad
Jim Russett, a Half-Orc Celestial Warlock who was a Sheriff of a small town before it was raided by a gang.
Azumi, a Tiefling Glamour Bard here from Japan to find her way after being banished.
and Misiyama, a Aztec Ranger here as a Bounty Hunter.
I tried to keep it simple, so the first thing they're doing is heading West on a train from a bunch of Sovereign State dwarves who live on a train that never stops (the Railroad Coalition of Dwarven Peoples) to hunt down Benny "The Tooth" Casserton, a gang leader that was the disgraced son of a plantation owner that got bankrupted during the Civil War. He's fled into the Donner Mountains (the Sierra Nevada, which has been infested with Wendigos after the Donners wigged out and ate each other, producing the first American Wendigos, that now stalk the mountains making it extremely lethal).
The party spent the first session climbing up the mountain, fighting animated snowmen with body parts inside (Benny is a practiced necromancer, and is using the body parts of his mangled gang to guard him). They were advised to seek refuge at a church halfway up the mountain, only to learn it was a church of skeletons. All priests that haven't passed on, spending their days arguing over the meaning of Revelations. (Jim, being a man of Faith, was quite proficient in the discussions and at the end, they performed a ritual to cast Death Ward on him as a gift.)
Gunshots bring the howls of Wendigos, and the party has been haggardly avoiding them the entire time. It's all come to a head however, and they're now at the top of the mountain, caught in the middle of a three-way fight between the chasing Wendigos, a Yeti who lives at the top of the mountain, and Benny (who has been slowly turning into a Wendigo and will mid-fight.)
And the session ended there, very excited for this campaign!
You peeps have any XGTE broken builds? I'm throwing scary things at the party this next go-round.
Nova type damage or minion builds or sorcadin and sorlock builds. Most of the ones I've looked at are light on exposition. Are they even still a thing?
Game breaking will depend on what facet of the game you want broken, and at what level. None really require Xanathar's to get going, but it does give some interesting options.
The easy and cheesy way is via summons. Surrounding somebody with 8 cr1/4 critters can ruin their day (constrictor snakes are a favorite of mine for this). Animating skeletons and giving them heavy crossbows. Toss ten ball bearings onto the ground and watch as they become a mobile claymore for you with Animate Object. The easiest and Chester Cheesiest is Conjure Woodland Beings. How would you like to have turn the entire party into Giant Apes for an hour a day, starting at level 7? Upgrades to T-Rexs at level 9? Why, just ask your friendly neighborhood Pixie to Polymorph you! With 8 per summon you get extras for when somebody actually loses the form or a pixie gets potshot.
Game breaking will depend on what facet of the game you want broken, and at what level. None really require Xanathar's to get going, but it does give some interesting options.
The easy and cheesy way is via summons. Surrounding somebody with 8 cr1/4 critters can ruin their day (constrictor snakes are a favorite of mine for this). Animating skeletons and giving them heavy crossbows. Toss ten ball bearings onto the ground and watch as they become a mobile claymore for you with Animate Object. The easiest and Chester Cheesiest is Conjure Woodland Beings. How would you like to have turn the entire party into Giant Apes for an hour a day, starting at level 7? Upgrades to T-Rexs at level 9? Why, just ask your friendly neighborhood Pixie to Polymorph you! With 8 per summon you get extras for when somebody actually loses the form or a pixie gets potshot.
And any sensible DM won't give you 8 pixies that know what a trex is.
I've seen the pixies thing. If I do it, that means my players can do it and I'm not opening that can of worms.
What I'm talking about is bone smashingly great damage dealers or nigh-unkillable NPC villains to throw at my large party of players.
I have a superspeed tabaxi monk that's going to look like Nightcrawler porting all over the place.
I have a build that gives super high AC and force bubbles.
I've seen a build where a dudes Magic Missile damage was incredibly over the top but he used some classes from the UA and I would like to stick to 5E SRD if at all possible.
I want scary adversaries that makes the party think "TPK".
nothing in XGTE is as broken as the base game paladin, unless you add 2 levels of hexblade to the base game paladin
- Add charisma to saving throws
- Use charisma to swing your sword
- Use charisma to spit lasers
- 2 smites back on short rest
- Use paladin spell slots to cast Shield raising your AC from unhittable to more unhittable
- Platemail
- A shield is usable as spellcasting focus
- Bonus round: Pick half-drow to be able to cast darkness, get the ability to see in magical darkness from your second invocation, also get elven accuracy. Swing away.
nothing in XGTE is as broken as the base game paladin, unless you add 2 levels of hexblade to the base game paladin
- Add charisma to saving throws
- Use charisma to swing your sword
- Use charisma to spit lasers
- 2 smites back on short rest
- Use paladin spell slots to cast Shield raising your AC from unhittable to more unhittable
- Platemail
- A shield is usable as spellcasting focus
- Bonus round: Pick half-drow to be able to cast darkness, get the ability to see in magical darkness from your second invocation, also get elven accuracy. Swing away.
My players found a Staff of Power yesterday(I do 100% random loot) and we have no sorcerors, wizards, or warlocks in the party. They got enough XP to level to 6, 5 and 4 respectively...
I am expecting to have a Monk/Warlock, Bard/Sorcerer, and Barbarian/Paladin/Wizard next session...
But for real though the Staff of Power is amazing for a Monk/Warlock (so long as you can deal with the MAD issues)
You peeps have any XGTE broken builds? I'm throwing scary things at the party this next go-round.
Nova type damage or minion builds or sorcadin and sorlock builds. Most of the ones I've looked at are light on exposition. Are they even still a thing?
Is there such a thing as a broken build in 5E?
I do not understand the question. You're the DM? Why do you need builds?
I *think* we finally have an agreed upon date for the second session of my mostly newbie "Nerdy Dads" D&D group.
First session of LMoP resulted in the party skipping the Crawmaw Hideout & heading straight to town. They collected a few side quests, split the party to explore, and the Bard player stepped on his own dick and, along with the Barbarian, picked a fight with the Ruffians. He would not back down. His friends eventually heard the ruckus and raced across town to help, but it was too late. Then they met a friendly new cleric in the bar! By the end of the session they headed back to the goblin ambush and found the caves. We ended there with the players learning to 1) Not bite off more than they can chew and 2) Not to split the party. \
You peeps have any XGTE broken builds? I'm throwing scary things at the party this next go-round.
Nova type damage or minion builds or sorcadin and sorlock builds. Most of the ones I've looked at are light on exposition. Are they even still a thing?
Is there such a thing as a broken build in 5E?
I do not understand the question. You're the DM? Why do you need builds?
This D&D campaign continues to be great, playing as a ridiculous fey creature (a pixie sorcerer) continues to foil my DM's plans and create significant peril for myself to the enjoyment of all
like while scouting a giant's bedroom up a long cliff from the party and accidentally getting covered in honey and rolling too badly to get my character's wings unstuck from each other, having to scamper about at 10 feet/6 seconds making stealth checks to avoid being seen (this named Oni seemed to have blindsight)
I activated an animated dagger item (one time use) to poke the giant in the balls as a distraction and quickly dragged a person sized treasure chest he had over to the window (with some difficulty) and used a random pile of soiled giant clothing (a sock or something) to break my fall diving to the bottom with the chest. Then I snuck back in after getting the wings unstuck and poured a bunch of sleeping poison in his drink that caused him to conk out and looted his stuff (dragging the items one at a time to the drop, including his sword) and drew a dick on his face in charcoal as one does (the giant narrowly failing a check to wake up, but I have to play the character correctly)
a cool few thousand gold for the party with only ALMOST getting eaten like a cheeto by a giant (who it turns out is a miniboss of this dungeon and will be asleep and unarmed still when the party gets up there)
For one thing it's amazing I'm not dead because I am compelled to be reckless and cause mischief. Also profoundly unwise, My character places far more value on anything small and shiny that could be used as a fashion accessory than actual value, a bag of marbles could easily be traded to me for a diamond. I also am committed to looting (not *keeping*, I don't care about monetary value and I don't want a character concept that's a dick to the players) everything, my bag of holding (tiny sized, but same internal volume) is damn near full (see misc non PHB/DMG contents in spoiler)
if you've played the module we're in you can even track our progress in the dungeon by my inventory list
Broken iron cube
Bronze Plaque depicting goblin tribe building pyramid 3 pounds
Cracked crystal sphere
Scroll with map of island - crudely drawn
Copper Nickel Dagger worth 10g
Bronze jade necklace serpent 50g
2 silk goblin monk robes
2 goblin lovers locked in 2500 year slumber (35 pounds each)
20 black candles emitting continual flame worth 15gp each
Giant Ruby Gem 100gp
Giant Necklace Onyx 125gp
Ornate small chest 300gp
Big ivory box 50 lbs 200g
5 tiger pelts knitted into a giant kilt 100gp
Identify Scroll
Goblinskin pelt (cloak worn by Oni)
10 pounds of broken weapons (spears/daggers)
Human skin tapestry (2)
Feathered Mask
2 human skulls
3 silos of jade filled with Rare spices 250gp
14 pots full of perfume 275gp total
60 gems, obsidian bracelets, topaz, tourmaline (totaling 450gp)
Lord of Snails medallion (1000g) (10 poudns)
Silver Coffer
376gp of random gems
Fake Door 25 pounds (Appears to be a real door when placed against a surface)
1 small figurines of jade and coral worth 25g
Coin necklaces and 8 bracers of beads
3 rings of jade and alabaster copper each
Outfit made of doppleganger skin
Poison making cylinder (press button > sprays poison, dc15 3d6)
Tiger man's Loincloth
Eagle whistle: you can blow the whistle for 5 times 5 +con modifier gives you 2x movement flight speed while blowing. 3 uses regain at dawn (steph has this - keep track of stats)
6 anatomically correct stuffed cats
Shell necklace worth 50gp
Topaz necklace 50gp
10 flawless pearls worth 20gp each
Paleda Ball (can be used to summon a court to play Paleda in any sufficiently sized room)
7 statues depicting sun god 30gp each
Fish skin bag
Fine silken robe (30gp each) halfling sized
250gp bracelet
Silver fan 50gp
Potion of minor sequester (2500 year sleep, interrupted if target is disturbed)
1000g of diamonds
Bead of minor animation +1 (Medium) Yellow (One time use: animates medium object as per Animate Objects)
Small Bag of sand
Very rusty dagger +1 (on a nat 1 it rusts the thing you stab, dealing 2d6 necrotic per turn for one minute then it melts)
Broken Crystal
Old piece of metal
Shiny polished rocks (8 pounds)
Clay Pot (8)
Dead fire beetles (12)
Severed pixie wing
Giant sized golden ring (ruby) 200g
Book of Dragons (details from each kind of dragon) > Unforgettable Bookmark: As long as you are on the same plane of existence as the book this bookmark is in, you know everything in the book and have advantage on checks related to its contents
Fire elemental trapped in an obsidian cylinder
188gp Alchemists materials
The party agreed to let me hold all the valuables since I got the bag of holding, and I have the most charisma for getting good deals later anyway when I'll give them all the gold, I got all the COOL items like "broken iron cube" and "small bag of sand" that my character cares about
The concept behind the character is a winter court pixie who was exiled from the feywild for severing the part of her personality that enjoys cruelty, as it always got in the way. The rub is that my pixie sometimes turns into a murderous redcap with all my spells, a physical manifestation of my repressed cruelty, and between game sessions (or sometimes during them, via text message), I have to tell the DM where I go and who I kill to sate the Redcap's need to kill. My character has no idea that she is the killer and so far I have done an amazing job throwing false leads. I even successfully planted some momentos of a kill in the druid's stuff during a long rest as she's by far the biggest threat with her perception, making everyone suspect her (her character was sleeping so she had to make some perception checks at disadvantage and had no idea why)
I hadn't expected a two line blurb in my backstory to inspire the main B plot of the campaign for the DM, he is absolutely loving the fact that all of the other players are absolutely convinced that my alter ego is the BBEG of the campaign
So, follow up on me teaching my bards how to be overpowered. I told the one pretending to be a cleric all the cool things you can do with Suggestion.
He decided to use it on a mercenary lord in the middle of his warcamp. He passed the save. Said bard is now hanging in the gallows. The other bard was cut down trying to save him, the barbarian jumped the walls and rolled 1 on his death saving throw, twice, after being impaled on a stockade. Our ranger escaped with an Alter Self spell, and I escaped by holding the mercenary lord hostage, but was eventually captured and conscripted.
Excuse me, all Brass Dragons like talking to everything and everyone all the time, 13 years old or not.
I think I might retcon the color right at the end of last game, something like copper might be far easier on me, as playing as a brass dragon correctly will mean trying to steal the spotlight from the party and talking to myself as two npcs do all the conversing
then again the character's previous personality could be best described as MTV's Daria, so it stands to reason it'd be some time before being a dragon would cause her to be a tremendous extrovert (she is Barovian after all)
The party made an enemy for life out of the leader of a caravan by murdering his dog in the first round of combat the players initiated, when the caravan leader escaped he vowed revenge and I guarantee is going to pop up when its least convenient!
After blowing nearly every ability the party had while defeating the caravan workers and their guards, a party member got himself ambushed by several homebrew giant lizard type creatures while the rest of his group were a decent distance away. The encounter should have been just on the edge of medium/hard but instead completely dismantled the party, the only person not making death saves at the end of combat was the rogue who never closed to melee until the last turn of combat against the last creature left.
Speaking of death saves: we very nearly had our first death! If not for an amazingly timed use of inspiration on a death save, the 1 rolled would have spelled death for the character with the most developed backstory and motivation! that would have broken my heart
It unlocks on Roll20 in ... 2 hours. I can give some info later. As far as I know there's something like ... 6 chapters?
First Chapter is leaders of the nine hells and tiefling options. I think that lines up with the UA about tieflings for the nine hells.
Elves. Gives subraces for each season of Eladrin. Revises Drow I think, adds Sea-Elves and Shadar-Kai.
Dwarves? I think it revises Duerger.
Gith? One of the chapters is Gith.
Halflings and Gnomes, revises Deep Gnomes.
Then there's a section of foes. The review I read said about 140 new monsters with a lot of stuff borrowed from other modules like Princes of Apocalypse or something, but the roll20 review said over 200 new monsters already statted and ready to go.
Every chapter has heaps of lore, it's a lore-heavy book. Kind of skimpy on the additional character creation options. I think XGTE has that covered. Volos does new races well. What this book does is adds a bunch of medium-high threat monsters to challenge players. If you're doing low-level campaigns that don't do a lot of multiverse stuff, you won't really need the book.
“Anyway,” said the Dean, “it’s dangerous. I’ve always felt that he only stays in the octogram for the look of the thing. I hate it when he peers at you and seems to be counting.”
There's also the scene where Death turns up outside the circle
Although when Susan is taking his place in Soul Music, she can't leave the circle until invited
I guess Death has more experience getting places where he isn't expected, such as when Greyhald Spold created a Death-proof chamber but forgot airholes (DARK IN HERE, ISN'T IT?)
Sorry, what were we talking about? I got Discstracted
I almost got eaten as my pixie sorcerer in Lost Shrine of Tamoachan. Giant tree monster had me in its clutches, my turn rolls around. The DM tells me with my 15 hitpoints that I am held before into its gaping maw.
I ask how big its maw is, like, whats the interior volume, layout.
"Rows of teeth, and fleshy, but big, nearly 10 feet in diameter internally"
"I cast conjure animals, I'd like to put 2 swarms of quippers right in there."
After that it was too occupied with what was happening in its internal geography to be concerned about the tiny flying creature it had caught
Session went well! We mostly just did the cragmaw hideout. They pulped the wolves in one turn. Not so easily survived the flood and crept back in and got the drop on the three Gobs manning the dam.
Yeemik's deal went south for him and a well rolled persuasion check got half the goblins in range of an sleep spell. The tanks were pretty much useless but the pair of rogues with sneak attack made short work of everything. Sildar has finally been saved.
Our Barbarian was very frustrated all night with very few kills until we got to the boss fight. One rogue went back to the garbage hole and failed all his attempts to climb up the chute, missing the fight entirely. Klarg got a good hit in, but a two round combo of Magic Missile and a Barbarian crit with a greataxe made short work of him.
A teeny bit of role-playing has crept in too! More than a bit of "my character feels like this so we're going to go left." and "My cleric would probably prioritize getting a wounded Sildar out of the way, so I won't pummel on the sleeping goblin"
I still miss the easy camraderie of my core group and wish we could meet more often , but these newer friends and acquaintances are making up for the long waits. Good times!
Found a new group/campaign - we are starting on Wednesday. I'm going armed with a bunch of different options for myself in case theres some overlap (I like making concepts and I know the other people are probably only going to have the 1 idea/thing they want to be so I don't mind switching that much). My wife is going to be a Merfolk Druid (of the land, arctic) with a penchant for never telling the truth about herself or her backstory.
Have two characters I like a lot, and then three other characters that I need to create a story for
Kenku Arcane Trickster
Cicada (name is literally the sound of a cicada). Story:
Of inconsequential parentage, of an indeterminate flock, Cicada was a street kid with nimble fingers, a knack for trouble, and a talent for misdirection. This made him valued in the street gang he fell sideways into, but the mistrust of Kenku (despite all of them being thieves) and their peculiar speech he was was isolated even while being celebrated for a deft score. In search of comradeship, he agreed readily to bigger jobs with bigger risks. Graduating to breaking and entering, Cicada was succesful for a while before getting caught and magically frozen in place while robbing a curiosities shop. The owner and arcane practicioner, Theran, took a shine to Cicada and noticed an interesting thing - Cicada had a thread of magic. CA year of tutelage in the arcane ensued and he came to see Theran as trusted friend, guardian, and maybe father figure.
Thats when Theran revealed that he needed Cicada for a job. A heist. Theran was a higher order of criminal - a confidence man. Cicada as a kenku, thief, and arcane user was essential to his plan.
Cicada wasn't sure what he was more angry about - the betrayal of his trust or that a heist sounded like a great time. Had Theran only ever seen him as a means to an end? Regardless, he needed some time to think. Maybe leave the city. Maybe find something else to do.
Tiefling Tome Warlock - The seeker or Great Old One
Arkasi Vaitici of the Vaitici clan. Story:
Arkasi is a young son of a small but rich insular clan of corrupt wealth agregators/power brokers.. and secretly Warlocks supporting their patron demon. The city and other local nobility don't trust them but their wealth gives them a strong shield from which to meddle. They are expecting Arkasi to carry on in the family line. But neither diligent family heir or diletante son, Arkasi is only interested in scholarly learning and somewhat exasperated by his family living up to the Tiefling stereotype. After he refused to apprentice with his Aunt, the Contessa of the clan, and using his family name out of turn to get a position working at University library, he was cut off from the family funds. Now living in a slum, using his access at the library to study late into the night, he wants nothing to do with his family or the demon lord that secretly sits behind their power, wealth and dark arts. Late one night he opens up a peculiar tome and his mind is almost rent asunder when the curious eyes of something other falls upon him. Much to his chagrin, his only survival lay in making a pact with this elder thing. At least it wasn't the family Demon.
Then the other three have no story yet
Feral Tiefling or Kenku Horizon Walker
Feral Tiefling or Kenku Shadow Monk
Tiefling Hexblade Warlock
The wife and I are putting together a game for a group that hasn't played before but is very enthusiastic.
We haven't told them but to get them in to the idea of making stuff up we're going to have them all start in a small town jail cell and explain why they're there.
KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
edited May 2018
I had an entire pointless session disguising myself on a casino ship, finding no evidence of the captain murdering someone, and then I got magicked off.
I tried to do this shit Bond style. Now I want to go Punisher.
I had an entire pointless session disguising myself on a casino ship, finding no evidence of the captain murdering someone, and then I got magicked off.
I tried to do this shit Bond style. Now I want to go Punisher.
Storm King's Thunder?
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KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
edited May 2018
Ye. I was the only one to make it on the ship and only got magicked to fall off rather than really get hurt but man. I made it into the captain’s cabin, found nothing, hid, the GM made it seem like I couldn’t just wait the captain out to go to sleep. I had no options, so I tried to make a story about the Hands of Yatar or whatever its called and tried to trick him to confessing by saying they *totally* owed him a favor with the letter the party had received earlier. Did not work. I didn’t steal his shit or bring weapons so he let me off pretty lightly.
Heh, having both played the adventure and then later having read it, i won't say anything in the open. My party for some reason read the situation way different from what it really was, but in the end we stumbled into where we needed to be anyway. Pretty funny. Don't read the below unless you want to see a spoiler...
We thought, for some reason, the Asian looking lady was some sort of ultra powerful archmage because she was immune to dinner if the party's mind read and similar shenanigans. Eventually when she wasn't looking we snuck into the captains room, murderhobo shived him, stole the info we needed, and escaped out a window into the river. We still don't have any idea what her deal was.
DM spoilers from reading the guide:
She is a mage but not a super powerful one, has we engaged get we'd have handed her her ass. She was just a worker/bouncer there. There was a shipwide antimagic field and none of us has thought of that being a possibility. It was set up to prevent cheating since it's s gambling establishment.
All the 'new' mechanical bits except the monster statblocks are right out of UA (some with minor changes, others exactly as printed in UA)
There are a bunch of high-CR monsters in the bestiary, which is cool, except a bunch of those (most notably the eight demon lords it stats out) were already printed in Out of the Abyss and appear exactly the same in Tome of Foes - lore, art, page layout, and all. They add some archdevils, but if you were looking to fight Asmodeus or Mephistopheles you're going to be underwhelmed - Zariel and Geryon are the only lords of the nine we get, and then there are a couple of second fiddles who don't rule a layer but are 'an important lieutenant of Mammon's' or whatever.
There's a bunch of lore of varying quality, including stuff that is new/changed, at least as far as I know (The Raven Queen isn't a god anymore! Elves are all exiled from Elf Heaven because they adopted fixed forms and genders and Corellon is Not Mad, Just Disappointed! Asmodeus' Ruby Rod is neither a badge of office, nor a powerful stolen shard of the Abyss, nor a fun nickname for his dick, but rather some sort of weird punishment from Primus that he's forced to carry at all times and which binds him and all devils to obey their contracts!)
Basically it might be worth getting if you're a DM looking for mid-high tier monsters (it does add a lot of new statblocks in the CR7-CR16 range) or you're particularly excited about the lore and don't like the extant lore you can read on the internet for free, but otherwise I wasn't especially impressed and remain disappointed by their habit of including a bunch of reprinted content in a new book and then offering you the opportunity to pay $50 to buy it again.
Posts
It's unfortunate. You should really go to http://www.reddit.com/r/mpmb to commiserate with like-minded individuals.
Here are some inspiration images to get the feel for the setting.
We had our first session today and it went pretty wonderfully!
Party:
Darius, a Black Tortle Barbarian from the Great Dismal Swamp working for the underground Railroad
Jim Russett, a Half-Orc Celestial Warlock who was a Sheriff of a small town before it was raided by a gang.
Azumi, a Tiefling Glamour Bard here from Japan to find her way after being banished.
and Misiyama, a Aztec Ranger here as a Bounty Hunter.
I tried to keep it simple, so the first thing they're doing is heading West on a train from a bunch of Sovereign State dwarves who live on a train that never stops (the Railroad Coalition of Dwarven Peoples) to hunt down Benny "The Tooth" Casserton, a gang leader that was the disgraced son of a plantation owner that got bankrupted during the Civil War. He's fled into the Donner Mountains (the Sierra Nevada, which has been infested with Wendigos after the Donners wigged out and ate each other, producing the first American Wendigos, that now stalk the mountains making it extremely lethal).
The party spent the first session climbing up the mountain, fighting animated snowmen with body parts inside (Benny is a practiced necromancer, and is using the body parts of his mangled gang to guard him). They were advised to seek refuge at a church halfway up the mountain, only to learn it was a church of skeletons. All priests that haven't passed on, spending their days arguing over the meaning of Revelations. (Jim, being a man of Faith, was quite proficient in the discussions and at the end, they performed a ritual to cast Death Ward on him as a gift.)
Gunshots bring the howls of Wendigos, and the party has been haggardly avoiding them the entire time. It's all come to a head however, and they're now at the top of the mountain, caught in the middle of a three-way fight between the chasing Wendigos, a Yeti who lives at the top of the mountain, and Benny (who has been slowly turning into a Wendigo and will mid-fight.)
And the session ended there, very excited for this campaign!
Nova type damage or minion builds or sorcadin and sorlock builds. Most of the ones I've looked at are light on exposition. Are they even still a thing?
Is there such a thing as a broken build in 5E?
Rock Band DLC | GW:OttW - arrcd | WLD - Thortar
The easy and cheesy way is via summons. Surrounding somebody with 8 cr1/4 critters can ruin their day (constrictor snakes are a favorite of mine for this). Animating skeletons and giving them heavy crossbows. Toss ten ball bearings onto the ground and watch as they become a mobile claymore for you with Animate Object. The easiest and Chester Cheesiest is Conjure Woodland Beings. How would you like to have turn the entire party into Giant Apes for an hour a day, starting at level 7? Upgrades to T-Rexs at level 9? Why, just ask your friendly neighborhood Pixie to Polymorph you! With 8 per summon you get extras for when somebody actually loses the form or a pixie gets potshot.
And any sensible DM won't give you 8 pixies that know what a trex is.
What I'm talking about is bone smashingly great damage dealers or nigh-unkillable NPC villains to throw at my large party of players.
I have a superspeed tabaxi monk that's going to look like Nightcrawler porting all over the place.
I have a build that gives super high AC and force bubbles.
I've seen a build where a dudes Magic Missile damage was incredibly over the top but he used some classes from the UA and I would like to stick to 5E SRD if at all possible.
I want scary adversaries that makes the party think "TPK".
- Add charisma to saving throws
- Use charisma to swing your sword
- Use charisma to spit lasers
- 2 smites back on short rest
- Use paladin spell slots to cast Shield raising your AC from unhittable to more unhittable
- Platemail
- A shield is usable as spellcasting focus
- Bonus round: Pick half-drow to be able to cast darkness, get the ability to see in magical darkness from your second invocation, also get elven accuracy. Swing away.
My players found a Staff of Power yesterday(I do 100% random loot) and we have no sorcerors, wizards, or warlocks in the party. They got enough XP to level to 6, 5 and 4 respectively...
I am expecting to have a Monk/Warlock, Bard/Sorcerer, and Barbarian/Paladin/Wizard next session...
But for real though the Staff of Power is amazing for a Monk/Warlock (so long as you can deal with the MAD issues)
I do not understand the question. You're the DM? Why do you need builds?
First session of LMoP resulted in the party skipping the Crawmaw Hideout & heading straight to town. They collected a few side quests, split the party to explore, and the Bard player stepped on his own dick and, along with the Barbarian, picked a fight with the Ruffians. He would not back down. His friends eventually heard the ruckus and raced across town to help, but it was too late. Then they met a friendly new cleric in the bar! By the end of the session they headed back to the goblin ambush and found the caves. We ended there with the players learning to 1) Not bite off more than they can chew and 2) Not to split the party.
Hyped for the next session!
That's true.
Still, it would be fun.
This D&D campaign continues to be great, playing as a ridiculous fey creature (a pixie sorcerer) continues to foil my DM's plans and create significant peril for myself to the enjoyment of all
like while scouting a giant's bedroom up a long cliff from the party and accidentally getting covered in honey and rolling too badly to get my character's wings unstuck from each other, having to scamper about at 10 feet/6 seconds making stealth checks to avoid being seen (this named Oni seemed to have blindsight)
I activated an animated dagger item (one time use) to poke the giant in the balls as a distraction and quickly dragged a person sized treasure chest he had over to the window (with some difficulty) and used a random pile of soiled giant clothing (a sock or something) to break my fall diving to the bottom with the chest. Then I snuck back in after getting the wings unstuck and poured a bunch of sleeping poison in his drink that caused him to conk out and looted his stuff (dragging the items one at a time to the drop, including his sword) and drew a dick on his face in charcoal as one does (the giant narrowly failing a check to wake up, but I have to play the character correctly)
a cool few thousand gold for the party with only ALMOST getting eaten like a cheeto by a giant (who it turns out is a miniboss of this dungeon and will be asleep and unarmed still when the party gets up there)
For one thing it's amazing I'm not dead because I am compelled to be reckless and cause mischief. Also profoundly unwise, My character places far more value on anything small and shiny that could be used as a fashion accessory than actual value, a bag of marbles could easily be traded to me for a diamond. I also am committed to looting (not *keeping*, I don't care about monetary value and I don't want a character concept that's a dick to the players) everything, my bag of holding (tiny sized, but same internal volume) is damn near full (see misc non PHB/DMG contents in spoiler)
if you've played the module we're in you can even track our progress in the dungeon by my inventory list
Bronze Plaque depicting goblin tribe building pyramid 3 pounds
Cracked crystal sphere
Scroll with map of island - crudely drawn
Copper Nickel Dagger worth 10g
Bronze jade necklace serpent 50g
2 silk goblin monk robes
2 goblin lovers locked in 2500 year slumber (35 pounds each)
20 black candles emitting continual flame worth 15gp each
Giant Ruby Gem 100gp
Giant Necklace Onyx 125gp
Ornate small chest 300gp
Big ivory box 50 lbs 200g
5 tiger pelts knitted into a giant kilt 100gp
Identify Scroll
Goblinskin pelt (cloak worn by Oni)
10 pounds of broken weapons (spears/daggers)
Human skin tapestry (2)
Feathered Mask
2 human skulls
3 silos of jade filled with Rare spices 250gp
14 pots full of perfume 275gp total
60 gems, obsidian bracelets, topaz, tourmaline (totaling 450gp)
Lord of Snails medallion (1000g) (10 poudns)
Silver Coffer
376gp of random gems
Fake Door 25 pounds (Appears to be a real door when placed against a surface)
1 small figurines of jade and coral worth 25g
Coin necklaces and 8 bracers of beads
3 rings of jade and alabaster copper each
Outfit made of doppleganger skin
Poison making cylinder (press button > sprays poison, dc15 3d6)
Tiger man's Loincloth
Eagle whistle: you can blow the whistle for 5 times 5 +con modifier gives you 2x movement flight speed while blowing. 3 uses regain at dawn (steph has this - keep track of stats)
6 anatomically correct stuffed cats
Shell necklace worth 50gp
Topaz necklace 50gp
10 flawless pearls worth 20gp each
Paleda Ball (can be used to summon a court to play Paleda in any sufficiently sized room)
7 statues depicting sun god 30gp each
Fish skin bag
Fine silken robe (30gp each) halfling sized
250gp bracelet
Silver fan 50gp
Potion of minor sequester (2500 year sleep, interrupted if target is disturbed)
1000g of diamonds
Bead of minor animation +1 (Medium) Yellow (One time use: animates medium object as per Animate Objects)
Small Bag of sand
Very rusty dagger +1 (on a nat 1 it rusts the thing you stab, dealing 2d6 necrotic per turn for one minute then it melts)
Broken Crystal
Old piece of metal
Shiny polished rocks (8 pounds)
Clay Pot (8)
Dead fire beetles (12)
Severed pixie wing
Giant sized golden ring (ruby) 200g
Book of Dragons (details from each kind of dragon) > Unforgettable Bookmark: As long as you are on the same plane of existence as the book this bookmark is in, you know everything in the book and have advantage on checks related to its contents
Fire elemental trapped in an obsidian cylinder
188gp Alchemists materials
The party agreed to let me hold all the valuables since I got the bag of holding, and I have the most charisma for getting good deals later anyway when I'll give them all the gold, I got all the COOL items like "broken iron cube" and "small bag of sand" that my character cares about
The concept behind the character is a winter court pixie who was exiled from the feywild for severing the part of her personality that enjoys cruelty, as it always got in the way. The rub is that my pixie sometimes turns into a murderous redcap with all my spells, a physical manifestation of my repressed cruelty, and between game sessions (or sometimes during them, via text message), I have to tell the DM where I go and who I kill to sate the Redcap's need to kill. My character has no idea that she is the killer and so far I have done an amazing job throwing false leads. I even successfully planted some momentos of a kill in the druid's stuff during a long rest as she's by far the biggest threat with her perception, making everyone suspect her (her character was sleeping so she had to make some perception checks at disadvantage and had no idea why)
I hadn't expected a two line blurb in my backstory to inspire the main B plot of the campaign for the DM, he is absolutely loving the fact that all of the other players are absolutely convinced that my alter ego is the BBEG of the campaign
He decided to use it on a mercenary lord in the middle of his warcamp. He passed the save. Said bard is now hanging in the gallows. The other bard was cut down trying to save him, the barbarian jumped the walls and rolled 1 on his death saving throw, twice, after being impaled on a stockade. Our ranger escaped with an Alter Self spell, and I escaped by holding the mercenary lord hostage, but was eventually captured and conscripted.
Sorry. I tried.
I think I might retcon the color right at the end of last game, something like copper might be far easier on me, as playing as a brass dragon correctly will mean trying to steal the spotlight from the party and talking to myself as two npcs do all the conversing
then again the character's previous personality could be best described as MTV's Daria, so it stands to reason it'd be some time before being a dragon would cause her to be a tremendous extrovert (she is Barovian after all)
Highlights:
The party made an enemy for life out of the leader of a caravan by murdering his dog in the first round of combat the players initiated, when the caravan leader escaped he vowed revenge and I guarantee is going to pop up when its least convenient!
After blowing nearly every ability the party had while defeating the caravan workers and their guards, a party member got himself ambushed by several homebrew giant lizard type creatures while the rest of his group were a decent distance away. The encounter should have been just on the edge of medium/hard but instead completely dismantled the party, the only person not making death saves at the end of combat was the rogue who never closed to melee until the last turn of combat against the last creature left.
Speaking of death saves: we very nearly had our first death! If not for an amazingly timed use of inspiration on a death save, the 1 rolled would have spelled death for the character with the most developed backstory and motivation! that would have broken my heart
First Chapter is leaders of the nine hells and tiefling options. I think that lines up with the UA about tieflings for the nine hells.
Elves. Gives subraces for each season of Eladrin. Revises Drow I think, adds Sea-Elves and Shadar-Kai.
Dwarves? I think it revises Duerger.
Gith? One of the chapters is Gith.
Halflings and Gnomes, revises Deep Gnomes.
Then there's a section of foes. The review I read said about 140 new monsters with a lot of stuff borrowed from other modules like Princes of Apocalypse or something, but the roll20 review said over 200 new monsters already statted and ready to go.
Every chapter has heaps of lore, it's a lore-heavy book. Kind of skimpy on the additional character creation options. I think XGTE has that covered. Volos does new races well. What this book does is adds a bunch of medium-high threat monsters to challenge players. If you're doing low-level campaigns that don't do a lot of multiverse stuff, you won't really need the book.
Although when Susan is taking his place in Soul Music, she can't leave the circle until invited
I guess Death has more experience getting places where he isn't expected, such as when Greyhald Spold created a Death-proof chamber but forgot airholes (DARK IN HERE, ISN'T IT?)
Sorry, what were we talking about? I got Discstracted
I ask how big its maw is, like, whats the interior volume, layout.
"Rows of teeth, and fleshy, but big, nearly 10 feet in diameter internally"
"I cast conjure animals, I'd like to put 2 swarms of quippers right in there."
After that it was too occupied with what was happening in its internal geography to be concerned about the tiny flying creature it had caught
Session went well! We mostly just did the cragmaw hideout. They pulped the wolves in one turn. Not so easily survived the flood and crept back in and got the drop on the three Gobs manning the dam.
Yeemik's deal went south for him and a well rolled persuasion check got half the goblins in range of an sleep spell. The tanks were pretty much useless but the pair of rogues with sneak attack made short work of everything. Sildar has finally been saved.
Our Barbarian was very frustrated all night with very few kills until we got to the boss fight. One rogue went back to the garbage hole and failed all his attempts to climb up the chute, missing the fight entirely. Klarg got a good hit in, but a two round combo of Magic Missile and a Barbarian crit with a greataxe made short work of him.
A teeny bit of role-playing has crept in too! More than a bit of "my character feels like this so we're going to go left." and "My cleric would probably prioritize getting a wounded Sildar out of the way, so I won't pummel on the sleeping goblin"
I still miss the easy camraderie of my core group and wish we could meet more often , but these newer friends and acquaintances are making up for the long waits. Good times!
Have two characters I like a lot, and then three other characters that I need to create a story for
Kenku Arcane Trickster
Cicada (name is literally the sound of a cicada). Story:
Thats when Theran revealed that he needed Cicada for a job. A heist. Theran was a higher order of criminal - a confidence man. Cicada as a kenku, thief, and arcane user was essential to his plan.
Cicada wasn't sure what he was more angry about - the betrayal of his trust or that a heist sounded like a great time. Had Theran only ever seen him as a means to an end? Regardless, he needed some time to think. Maybe leave the city. Maybe find something else to do.
Tiefling Tome Warlock - The seeker or Great Old One
Arkasi Vaitici of the Vaitici clan. Story:
Then the other three have no story yet
Feral Tiefling or Kenku Horizon Walker
Feral Tiefling or Kenku Shadow Monk
Tiefling Hexblade Warlock
But the arctic features and spells fit well with the Merfolk thing - its all icey and watery
buuuuut
To my understanding a ton of plants grow in the ground under water.
Kelp grove or I feed
We haven't told them but to get them in to the idea of making stuff up we're going to have them all start in a small town jail cell and explain why they're there.
I tried to do this shit Bond style. Now I want to go Punisher.
Storm King's Thunder?
DM spoilers from reading the guide:
All the 'new' mechanical bits except the monster statblocks are right out of UA (some with minor changes, others exactly as printed in UA)
There are a bunch of high-CR monsters in the bestiary, which is cool, except a bunch of those (most notably the eight demon lords it stats out) were already printed in Out of the Abyss and appear exactly the same in Tome of Foes - lore, art, page layout, and all. They add some archdevils, but if you were looking to fight Asmodeus or Mephistopheles you're going to be underwhelmed - Zariel and Geryon are the only lords of the nine we get, and then there are a couple of second fiddles who don't rule a layer but are 'an important lieutenant of Mammon's' or whatever.
There's a bunch of lore of varying quality, including stuff that is new/changed, at least as far as I know (The Raven Queen isn't a god anymore! Elves are all exiled from Elf Heaven because they adopted fixed forms and genders and Corellon is Not Mad, Just Disappointed! Asmodeus' Ruby Rod is neither a badge of office, nor a powerful stolen shard of the Abyss, nor a fun nickname for his dick, but rather some sort of weird punishment from Primus that he's forced to carry at all times and which binds him and all devils to obey their contracts!)
Basically it might be worth getting if you're a DM looking for mid-high tier monsters (it does add a lot of new statblocks in the CR7-CR16 range) or you're particularly excited about the lore and don't like the extant lore you can read on the internet for free, but otherwise I wasn't especially impressed and remain disappointed by their habit of including a bunch of reprinted content in a new book and then offering you the opportunity to pay $50 to buy it again.