Tag: 4e

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DM Resources Skill Challenges

Skill Challenge: Temple Treasure

A recent earthquake has uncovered a temple from a long-forgotten age. Rogues from a nearby town immediately tried to loot the temple, but were injured or killed by magical traps still active within. The head of the local church believes that if magic preserved the traps, perhaps it also preserved books, tomes, or other magical artifacts. He has been trying to put together a party to explore the temple, but the local folk are too afraid to do it.

Setup

  • The party’s Cleric or Paladin is requested by his order to help his fellow worshiper and recover any books in the temple.
  • The head of the church hires the PCs to recover any books that might be preserved in the temple.
  • The PCs fear that powerful undead may dwell inside the ancient temple. If they don’t act quickly to destroy the evil, it will threaten the welfare of the nearby town.
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Editorial Humour

Confessions of a Gamer

Are you proud to be a gamer? Or do you hide the fact that once a week you play Dungeons & Dragons? I’m 34 years old, I’m a gamer and I’m proud to admit it.

I’ve been playing RPGs since I was 10, so 24 years now. And during that time I’ve met many different types of gamers. Most, like me, are proud to be gamers. Others are what I like to call “in the closet gamers.” They loved to play D&D, but would die a slow and painful social death if anyone outside of our immediate gaming group learned this terrible secret.

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DM Resources

Campaign Design: Prevalence of Magic & Cosmology

What would a fantasy setting be without magic and divine beings fighting their celestial wars? At this point you have decided which historical and fictional elements to use in defining your campaign world. You are now ready to start fleshing the world out in greater detail.

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Class Discussions Player Resources

Familiars Have Arrived

Yesterday, Ameron congratulated Wizards of the Coast for removing familiars from 4e D&D. While many of you may agree that familiars were an unnecessary game mechanic that added little value, others may miss the little critters. We’ve since learned that Wizards is bringing back familiars later this year in Arcane Power. But for those of you who don’t want to wait that long, we present our take on familiars.

Why would someone miss familiars you might ask? Let’s take a look why this might be the case. Familiars are cool. That’s right, having a hawk circling the battlefield or a snake wrapped around your staff is just a cool statement about your Wizard. It adds to your PC’s personality and can provide for some interesting role playing. Is that a Ferret in your pocket or…?

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Class Discussions Player Resources

Where Are The Familiars?

During my weekly game the person playing the Wizard made an interesting observation. D&D 4e is the first edition of the game not to offer the Wizard class the option of taking a familiar. I have yet to play a Wizard in 4e and even if I had I don’t know if I would have even noticed this omission. I’ve never liked familiars. They always felt like an afterthought to the spell casting classes. In my opinion we can say good riddance to bad rubbish. Good call, Wizards of the Coast!

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DM Resources Skill Challenges

Skill Challenge: Travelling Underground

The PCs travel through a particularity hazardous section of underground passages.

Setup

  • The PCs are searching for a long lost treasure or artifact. Their search has led them deep underground.
  • Miners from a nearby community discover a preexisting passage that leads deep underground. The PCs are hired to explore the cavern and see where it leads.
  • An escaped criminal flees through a cavernous mountain passage. The PCs are hired to capture him.

This skill challenge is broken into five encounters. In order to overcome the skill challenge the PCs must complete all five encounters. The DM can present the encounters in any order he sees fit. Each encounter will indicate the maximum number of successes that can be earned during that encounter. Failures are cumulative and carry forward through the entire skill challenge.

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Month in Review

Month in Review: February 2009

We’ve reached our first significant milestone: Dungeon’s Master has been live for one month. As we promised in our first post, we published one new article every day during February. Thank you to all the readers who have checked us out and kept coming back. We welcome your comments and feedback, so please let us know what you think.

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DM Resources

Campaign Design: Historical and Fictional References

In the last article we dealt with the Next Steps in campaign design, today we’ll discuss various campaign settings, historical periods, novels and talk about the themes that exist within the fantasy genre. This is my favourite part of design as it’s where you get to really dream about the different possibilities. Make sure you have your notebook handy and any of the Resources that you’ve collected to help you along the way. You’re bound to have more than a few flash insights at moments that you aren’t actively working on your campaign world and you’ll want to jot them down for future use.

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DM Resources Player Resources Skill Challenges

Skill Focus: Assisting (Part 1)

As I’ve said numerous times before, the addition of skill challenges to 4e D&D was a stroke of genius. It has provided us with the means to develop our characters in ways beyond excellence with a sword. We finally have a mechanism for using Acrobatics, Diplomacy and Thievery in a meaningful way that will yield XP.

Not all characters are strong in a variety of skills (Fighters, we’re looking at you), but thanks to the assist even the most unskilled PC can participate in a meaningful way during the skill challenge. My concern is that the assist mechanism is broken. So I’m going to share with you my ideas on how to fix it.

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DM Resources Skill Challenges

Skill Challenge: Rightful Heir

The lord of the land is ill and dying. The man next in the line of succession is a tyrant. There are rumours that the lord has an illegitimate son who could challenge for the throne.

Setup

  • The reputation of the PCs honesty and fairness has reached the ear of the lord’s loyal aide. Since the PCs are neutral and have no stake in the outcome, he hires them to find the rightful heir if he exists.
  • The PCs have had run-ins with the tyrant before. His rise to power would be the beginning of huge long-term problems for the PCs. A different heir would make their lives easier.
  • A letter from a close friend or family member arrives explaining the situation, pleading for the PCs to help in any way they can.
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