Adventuring is a high risk profession. Traversing harsh terrain, exploring the cavernous underdark and fighting dragons are just a few things that may lead to an adventurer’s untimely and unexpected death. In a game with magical healing and resurrection rituals, the truly powerful don’t remain dead for long. But there will come a time when someone’s death truly means that they are gone forever. Honouring the dead can be an important role-playing experience to the larger campaign.
Tag: Dungeons and Dragons
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Monsters on the Menu
When was the last time you gave any thought to what your character eats? If your gaming group is anything like mine you don’t even track rations on your character sheet. A lot of players are content to let the little details remain little and not worrying about them. (It’s a good thing they have faithful servant to see to these things.) But in a fantasy RPGs like D&D, the world is full of strange and exotic creatures. So doesn’t it make sense that some of these beasts would eventually find there way into common cuisine?
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More Tips for Speeding Up Your Game
Combat in 4e D&D does take longer as PCs get tougher. But there are a lot of tips and tricks for Speeding Up Your Game. We’ve come up with a few new ideas on how to keep your game move quickly and smoothly.
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Respect Your Faithful Servant Or Else…
Although your faithful servant isn’t invisible he might as well be. He’s overlooked and often forgotten. Whenever you stop for an extended rest, the faithful servant is the one who sets up camp. He tends to your armor, weapons and other equipment. He sees that your horse is fed and groomed. He makes dinner and cleans up afterwards. Without the faithful servant you’d be lost. Yet you barely acknowledge him or even address him.
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Use Your Daily Powers Every Day
Do you use all of your daily powers every day? If you’re anything like me, you’re reluctant to use them if they won’t yield the best possible results. But how often have you held your daily powers in reserve and then not had a chance to use them? I know this happens to me almost every time I play.
PCs in 4e D&D have numerous powers at their disposal. Encounter powers are tougher than at-will powers, and daily powers are tougher than encounter powers. So if the daily powers are the strongest in you PC’s arsenal why are they not being used more often? By not using your daily powers every day you are, in essence, putting your PC at a disadvantage and are less effective.
Keith Baker, creator of Eberron, took time out of his busy schedule to answer 13 questions for us.
When we ran our early Eberron Campaign Guide review in July, it generated a lot of buzz and a lot of comments. I was thrilled to see that the book’s author, Mr. Baker himself, not only took the time to read our review but offered his 2 cents by leaving some comments of his own.
I was fortunate enough to meet Mr. Baker in person a few times during this summer’s GenCon. He’s a very friendly and down-to-earth guy. I sat in on his free-for-all discussion about Eberron and it was well worth it. As you’d probably expect, he speaks of Eberron with remarkable enthusiasm. His insights into the draconic prophecy, resurrection in Eberron and undersea adventuring was awesome.
When Mr. Baker agreed to answer a few questions for us, the team at Dungeon’s Master tried to come up with something unique. We wanted to pose questions that Mr. Baker may not have been asked before or probably isn’t asked that often. We finally decided to just ask the questions that we, as gamers who play in Eberron every week, would find interesting. We hope that you find this Q&A as enlightening and enjoyable as we do.
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Month in Review: August 2009
August may be gone, but it is certainly not a month to be fogotten. We ran a lot of great articles and brought you our highlights and opinions about this year’s GenCon. Dungeon’s Master continues to grow every month and August was no exception. Thanks to all of our readers, especially those who comment regularily. Your feedback helps us improve and often gives us ideas on what kind of articles to write moving forward. So to all of our readers, thanks for making August great and we look forward to providing you with a lot more to read and talk about throughout September. For those who are new to Dungeon’s Master or if you missed some of our articles while you were on summer vacation, here are the month’s highlights. Enjoy.
Eberron is a world awash in intrigue and danger. The Last War is over but many of its secrets linger on. Armies continue to skirmish and raid across the borders. Royal Courts are awash with deception. Dragonmarked Houses vie for continued economic and political power.
The Day of Mourning may have brought the open conflict to an end, but the silent cold war continues. As the war waged on discoveries were made and secrets were kept. The House Sivis Repository and the Blood Fields of House Tharashk are two closely guarded secrets that came out of the war.
Discover more Secrets of Eberron Revealed in our latest installments of this ongoing series.
“That’ll be two gold for the drinks and the meal,” says the waitress as she clears your plates and refills your mugs.
“Here you go, darling” says Braddoc the Fighter as he slides a few coins across the table. “This should take care of the bill along with a few extra for you.”
“Um, thanks,” she says as she eyes the coins awkwardly.
“What’s the problem?” ask Braddoc.
“You have to pay in real money. I can’t take these strange coins.”
Many aspects of D&D are simplified in order to make the game run smoothly. Currency squarely falls into this category. Currency in D&D is typically the same regardless of where you are in the campaign world and what you’re trying to buy. What 1 gp buys in your home town is generally what 1 gp buys in the next town. But if you’re looking to add a little bit of flavour to your next campaign why not treat money in D&D a little bit more like it’s handled in real life?
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Your AC Is What?!?
The evenings gaming session is going great. So far you’ve had some great role playing, a unique skill challenge and now you’re entering the first encounter of the evening. The defender charges into combat. The NPC’s turn comes up and you decide to attack the defender by using one of the NPC’s encounter powers. You roll the dice and call out the attack score. This is going to hit you think, only to have the defender calmly announce that you’ve missed his AC by a long shot.
What do you do when session after session you can never hit the defender or when one player min/maxs their character to the point of absurdity?