Author: Ameron (Derek Myers)

Categories
D&D Encounters Dark Sun Player Resources

D&D Encounters Dark Sun Character Skill Cards

The six pre-generated characters provided for D&D Encounters Dark Sun are so condensed that they only list the three or four skills each PC is trained in. So for everyone playing D&D Encounters season two, I’ve created skill cards for each character.

I’ll admit that the character sheet cards Wizards provided look great, but other than the aesthetic quality, the cards are terrible. They provide the absolute bare minimum detail required to play the characters. Some might even argue that they don’t even contain that much.

Continue reading “D&D Encounters Dark Sun Character Skill Cards”
Categories
Dark Sun Editorial

D&D Encounters Dark Sun (Week 3)

What do you get when four PCs are attacked by goblins from high atop a rocky outcropping? One hell of a tough encounter. Week 3 was another grueling session for the players at my table. They eventually defeated all of the monsters, but the toll on their personal resources was costly. If they thought encounter 3 was tough, encounters 4 and 5 will be nearly impossible without a significant turn of events.

There they were getting pelted from above when we took stock of party’s ranged attack options. Yuka, no ranged attacks. Phye, no ranged attacks. Shikirr, no ranged attacks. That left Barcan. The same Barcan with only 2 healing surges remaining. Barcan with the poorest defenses of all the pre-generated characters. After only 5 minutes we knew this was going to ugly.

Continue reading “D&D Encounters Dark Sun (Week 3)”
Categories
DM Resources Editorial

5 Errors I’ve Made as DM

DMs aren’t perfect. There I’ve said it. Any DM that claims he’s never made an error when running a game is lying. Even the best DMs make mistakes. Over the years I’ve made plenty of errors while playing D&D. I’ve found that the best thing to do in these situations is to try and learn from the experience. So today I’m going to share with you the 5 biggest and most egregious errors I’ve made as a DM. I think you’ll find that these are fairly common mistakes made by DMs across the board.

Continue reading “5 Errors I’ve Made as DM”
Categories
DM Resources Player Resources

Change, Change, and More Change to RPGA Play

Last week both the RPGA Character Creation Guide and the Living Forgotten Realms Character Creation Guide were updated. Both documents are effective tomorrow (June 22, 2010). This is the last update scheduled for either document until October. So if you play Living Forgotten Realms (LFR) or you’re planning on going to GenCon to play D&D then you should check out these updates. This is probably the largest single update since 4e was released. Here are the highlights.

Continue reading “Change, Change, and More Change to RPGA Play”
Categories
Dark Sun Editorial

D&D Encounters Dark Sun (Week 2)

This week I got a double dose of Dark Sun. I was on vacation last week, but before I left I made arrangements with 6 players to skip the first week and run encounters one and two back-to-back this week. After just two sessions of Fury of the Wastewalker I have to admit that I like this adventure a whole lot more than Halaster’s Lost Apprentice.

D&D Encounters is a 15-part adventure from Wizards of the Coast and it’s played out one encounter each week over 15 weeks.

Continue reading “D&D Encounters Dark Sun (Week 2)”
Categories
DM Resources Eberron

Secrets of Eberron Revealed (Part 7)

Even though we’ve spent a lot of time discussing Dark Sun over the past few weeks we still play our weekly game in Eberron and are still committed to bringing you Eberron-specific articles. With this latest installment in our ongoing series, Secrets of Eberron Revealed, we look at how Dragonmarks are permanently removed and how Dragonmarks can be made to manifest for a short time.

  • Every member of a Dragonmarked house knows that one of the harshest punishments they can receive is to be excoriated – permanent banishment from the house. But when the house brings in The Effacers the punishment becomes so much worse.
  • Have you every wished you had a Dragonmark, even for just a short time? The Drakes may be able to help you.

Click on the Eberron tab above the Dungeon’s Master banner to find the previous installments in this ongoing series as well as many other great Eberron articles and resources.

Continue reading “Secrets of Eberron Revealed (Part 7)”
Categories
Book Reviews

Monster Manual 3: An Early Review

On shelves tomorrow, Monster Manual 3 is exactly what you’d expect from the new creature catalog. It’s chalked full of new monsters – some brand new and many other old favourites that have been noticeably absent from 4e D&D. There are about 300 monsters in the Monster Manual 3. About 125 are heroic tier, 100 paragon tier and 75 at epic tier. With more of us playing at paragon and epic tier, these new creatures give DMs more high level foes to throw at those poor unsuspecting PCs.

Continue reading “Monster Manual 3: An Early Review”
Categories
DM Resources Editorial

A 4e D&D Rules Question: Teleporting What You Can’t See

DMs are encouraged to say yes whenever possible in 4e D&D. But in a recent game we experienced a situation that was very unusual and saying yes didn’t seem appropriate. As the DM I said no at the time but agreed that we should do some investigation before the situation happens again. I’ve been scouring the boards to see if anyone else has encounter the same problem and after two weeks of searching I haven’t found a definitive answer. So for the first time since we started Dungeon’s Master I’m asking our readers for their thoughts and interpretation on the correct way to interpret this ruling. I suspect that there won’t be a clear-cut right or wrong answer, but I’d like to get some input from the online 4e D&D community before my next home game.

Continue reading “A 4e D&D Rules Question: Teleporting What You Can’t See”
Categories
Book Reviews Dark Sun

Review: The Outcast (A Dark Sun Novel)

The Outcast
(Tribe of One, book I)
Simon Hawke

A Dark Sun novel

I’ve read over a hundred Forgotten Realms novels, a dozen Ravenloft novels and all of the Eberron novels, but this was my first Dark Sun novel. Having never played in the Dark Sun camping setting when it was originally released back in the early 90s I never had any desire to read about a world I was unfamiliar with. However, in light of the upcoming re-launch of Dark Sun for 4e D&D I felt it was time to give the Dark Sun books a chance. I had no idea what I was in for.

Continue reading “Review: The Outcast (A Dark Sun Novel)”
Categories
D&D Encounters

D&D Encounters (Week 12)

After 12 weeks the adventure came to a thrilling conclusion. The PCs finally came face-to-face with Xeres. But he wasn’t alone. The ensuing battle was a worthy conclusion to season one of D&D Encounters, Halaster’s Lost Apprentice.

D&D Encounters is a 12-part adventure from Wizards of the Coast and it’s played out one encounter each week over 12 weeks.

Continue reading “D&D Encounters (Week 12)”