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Friday Favourite: Adventure Hooks – Campaigns in the Cold

On Friday we comb through our extensive archives to find an older article that we feel deserves another look. From January 18, 2011, Dungeon’s Master once again presents: Adventure Hooks – Campaigns in the Cold.

This summer we ran a series of adventure hooks that featured numerous bizarre and strange happenings that occurred in the Sun & Moon Tavern (part 1| part 2). These articles have been incredibly popular and continue to be among our most widely read pages from the past six months. It seems pretty clear to us that our readers want more short, quick adventure hooks.

One of the reasons the Adventure Hooks from the Sun & Moon Tavern were so popular was that they all centered around one common location. It made coming up with the adventure hooks easier for me as the DM, but I think it also made them more appealing for readers.

Before I sat down to brainstorm more adventure hooks I wanted to come up with a theme to tie them all together. The answer was as simple as looking out my front door. I decided to put together adventure hooks that all took place in a snowy environment.

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Friday Favourite: No New Magic Items

On Friday we comb through our extensive archives to find an older article that we feel deserves another look. From December 7, 2011, Dungeon’s Master once again presents: No New Magic Items.

What if it was no longer possible to make new magical items? We don’t often focus on the magic item creation side of the game; we just assume that somewhere in the background new items are being created. When your PC needs new magical items he can usually got to “Ye Olde Magic Shoppe” and purchase what he needs. But if the supply of new items stopped how would the economy of D&D change and what would that mean for your campaign?

How things play out really depends on whether or not you’re introducing this idea to an existing campaign world where magic used to be plentiful and is about to dry up, or if you’re establishing this as the norm for a brand new setting. If the PCs and other inhabitants of the world don’t know any differently then this is just going to mean a shift in the way your players think about acquiring items. If items have always been rare then the world’s mentality should reflect this. The idea of a party walking around and each PC having 10 or more magic items would be absurd. But if this is a sudden change then the only way to acquire new magical items is to find them in a treasure horde or take them from someone else. Both situations present interesting challenges and both could make for a very interesting long-term campaign.

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DM Resources Friday Favourites

Friday Favourite: Hey, Isn’t That My Character? Using Retired PCs As NPCs

On Friday we comb through our extensive archives to find an older article that we feel deserves another look. From April 30, 2010, Dungeon’s Master once again presents: Hey, Isn’t That My Character: Using Retired PCs As NPCs.

A good NPC can make a campaign. A bad one, well bad NPCs are usually forgotten fairly quickly. With this in mind it’s in a DMs best interest to ensure that his key NPCs have detailed stories to accompany them. By providing these NPCs with quirks, strengths and weaknesses it provides the PC with more reason to interact and develop a relationship. This in turn makes it easier for the DM to move the story along, twining the PCs concerns with those of the NPC. Of course this takes a lot of work and as the PCs progress new NPCs are required, with new stories and reason to motivate the PCs.

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Friday Favourites

Friday Favourite: Cheating in Dungeons & Dragons

On Friday we comb through our extensive archives to find an older article that we feel deserves another look. From April 17, 2009, Dungeon’s Master once again presents: Cheating in Dungeons & Dragons.

People always look for short cuts or ways to get something for nothing. Why wouldn’t you take an opportunity to get ahead should the right circumstances present themselves?

Role playing games are not exempt from cheating. In fact, the game relies a lot on trust (something we’ll be exploring in a coming article). But what happens when players and DMs decide to cheat? How does that affect the game?

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Friday Favourites

Friday Favourite: Splitting the Party Successfully

On Friday we comb through our extensive archives to find an older article that we feel deserves another look. From April 23, 2012, Dungeon’s Master once again presents: Splitting the Party Successfully.

Experience teaches player to never split the party. However, there are times when it doesn’t make sense for the party to remain together. This might be because there are many tasks to complete in a limited amount of time or it might be because some party members have skills or powers that make them uniquely qualified to handle a task alone. Yet when presented with any opportunity to split the party, no matter how logical it might seem to do so, a lot of players insist on staying together. It’s a knee-jerk reaction that is not founded in any rational assessment of the situation. It’s an instinctual response based on a previous disaster and a slogan ingrained into them by the Wizards marketing department. Players need to take a deep breath and repeat after me: Sometimes it’s a good idea to split the party.

My gaming group has actually had a lot of success when splitting the party. It’s not something we do very often, but we are certainly open to the possibility when it makes sense. Most often when we split up each group or individual ends up with their own mini skill challenge, but every so often the DM has something else in mind and combat occurs while the party is separated from each other. We’ve found that there are ways to make combat with a split party work. It’s definitely challenging, but our approach to these situations are always fun and rarely result in anyone being left out while their character is off screen.

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Friday Favourites

Friday Favourite: Undead Make the Scariest Villains

On Friday we comb through our extensive archives to find an older article that we feel deserves another look. From January 12, 2011, Dungeon’s Master once again presents: Undead Make the Scariest Villains.

Would you rather fight a beholder or a zombie? This is a much more complicated question than you might realize. Look at this through the eyes of your character and not through the eyes of a meta-gamer. In-character what is the scariest monster you can imagine? For me it’s undead more than any other.

Most monsters are, well, monstrous. They are clearly different than you and they must be destroyed. The beholder is an abomination. It’s scary, and a big party of what makes it scary is that it doesn’t conform to a physical shape you’re comfortable with. It’s a giant floating ball with eyestalks swirling about. Even if you’d never seen a beholder before and knew nothing about it, your initial instinct as an adventurer would be to attack and destroy something so awful.

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DM Resources Friday Favourites

Friday Favourite: Time in D&D

On Friday we comb through our extensive archives to find an older article that we feel deserves another look. From April 7, 2010, Dungeon’s Master once again presents: Time in D&D.

Raise your hand if you’ve ever created a level 1 PC, entered a dungeon, killed a bunch of monsters, gained a bunch of levels while still inside the dungeon and then realized that only a few weeks of actual in-game time passed when you emerge. I know I’m not the only one reading this that has his hand up.

Time in D&D is an aspect of the game I find is overlooked way too often. Tracking time in your game may not be that big a deal, but the longer you continue playing that same PC the more important time becomes.

So just how long does it take to go from level 1 to level 2? In 4e D&D it takes about 10-13 encounters or about four gaming sessions. But what I really want to know is how much time passes in-game between levels?

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Friday Favourite: 5 Tips To Increase Role-Playing At Your Game Table

On Friday we comb through our extensive archives to find an older article that we feel deserves another look. From February 8, 2011, Dungeon’s Master once again presents: 5 Tips To Increase Role-Playing At Your Game Table.

Role-playing has featured prominently in several 4e blogs over the past few weeks. The topics and approaches to the subject have varied widely, from how to speed up combat to allow for more time to role-play to introducing new mechanics to encourage role-playing. Our own post on the 4th action is one of the later articles. The subject of role-playing in 4e has been of great debate since its release with many debating how much role-playing the edition allows.

Some have argued that skill challenges are the mechanic in 4e that facilitates role-playing. While skill challenges can certainly accomplish this task, to state that they are the only way to role-play in 4e is rather naive. I strongly believe that if your gaming group wants to role-play it will. I also believe that some players are more willing to embrace role-playing than others.

Role-playing can be an uncomfortable experience for some players. It requires taking on an alternate personality and sharing that with the rest of the game table. Included below are five tips that a DM can use to foster role-playing at the table.

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In Anticipation of GenCon: Convention Tips 6 for Players, 6 for DMs

gencon-logo-01In one week throngs of gamers will descend upon downtown Indianapolis for GenCon 2013. Although the best four days in gaming doesn’t officially begin until Thursday, August 15, most convention goers will arrive on Wednesday. We’ve searched through the Dungeon’s Master archives and everyday leading up to GenCon we’ll share articles that provide tips for players and DMs that are specifically related to conventions and public play. Of course these tips are often just as valid in your home games so even if you’re not going to GenCon we think you’ll find these tips applicable. Be sure to visit Dungeon’s Master every day between now and GenCon to see what kind of tips we’re sharing.

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Adventure Hooks DM Resources Friday Favourites

Friday Favourite: Traps & Hazards: The Sword in the Stone

sword-in-a-stoneOn Friday we comb through our extensive archives to find an older article that we feel deserves another look. From May 19, 2010, Dungeon’s Master once again presents: Traps & Hazards: The Sword in the Stone.

What do you do when you discover an ancient red dragon living in your neighbourhood? You get adventurers to kill it, of course. But what happens if the adventurers don’t kill the dragon? It will be angry that you tried to kill it and it will likely destroy your village. If only there was a way to keep sending adventurers against the dragon while avoiding the dragon’s wrath after each failed attempt. The inhabitants of Burrow’s Scar have come up with just such a plan. Unfortunately for your PCs, they are likely to be the next heroes tricked into face the dragon.

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