Tag: Lair Assault

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Friday Favourites Player Resources

Friday Favourite: Prove Your D&D Superiority

On Friday we comb through our extensive archives to find an older article that we feel deserves another look. From December 14, 2010, Dungeon’s Master once again presents: Prove Your D&D Superiority.

When I play games, I play to win. I want to be the best and I want everyone else to know that I’m the best. For most table-top games there is a clearly defined way to identify the winner. In fact many games – including Monopoly, Scrabble and Chess – all have tournaments or championships to crown the best of the best.

When it comes to D&D it’s just not that easy. How do you prove to the guys at your table, and more importantly other gamers, that you are the best at D&D? I’ve given it a lot of thought and I’ve got suggestions for determining the best of the best once and for all.

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D&D Encounters

Public Play

a-to-z-letters-pI believe that public play is one of the best advertisements we have for our games. By playing in plain sight you give others a chance to see what’s going on. The mystery of Settlers of Catan or Dungeons & Dragons is revealed as people hover around the table and watch. This is true for all games including RPGs, card games and board games. Every time I play a board game at my FLGS someone walks by and asks about it.

For years the only place I ever played games was at home. D&D was just another one of my nerd hobbies. I had enough problems with social awkwardness during my teenage years that the last thing I needed was additional ridicule from my peers because I was playing D&D in public. It wasn’t until many, many years later that I realized how much there was to be gained through public play.

Throughout April Dungeon’s Master is participating in the Blogging from A to Z Challenge. The challenge is to write a new article ever day in April, excluding Sundays. That’s 26 articles over the course of the month. To make things even more interesting the title of each article will begin with a different letter of the alphabet. We bring gaming to the masses as “P” is for Public Play in today’s article.

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Editorial

Optimize For Best Results

a-to-z-letters-oOptimize, to make the best or most effective use of a situation, opportunity or resource.

The mechanics of 4e D&D practically demand you optimize your character and your party. Failure to do so can result in some unfortunate consequences. Monsters are designed based on the assumption that you have created your character to gain maximum damage output. Failure to do this, while not catastrophic, can lead to a less than ideal experience.

Throughout April Dungeon’s Master is participating in the Blogging from A to Z Challenge. The challenge is to write a new article ever day in April, excluding Sundays. That’s 26 articles over the course of the month. To make things even more interesting the title of each article will begin with a different letter of the alphabet. Today “O” is for optimization as we explore the reasons behind why players may optimize their characters.

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D&D Encounters

Lair Assault: Into the Pit of Madness – Round-up

a-to-z-letters-lOn May 31 the Liar Assault program comes to an end. Until then the active adventure is the level 10 extravaganza Into the Pit of Madness. I had an opportunity to run it for two groups at my FLGS last week and today I’m going to share my thoughts and insights on the 7th and final Lair Assault.

The adventure puts the PCs in a situation where the very fate of the world hangs in the balance. Cultists are trying to free the Chained God, Tharizdun, form his eternal prison. If freed Tharizdun will plunge the world as we know it into eternal darkness. High stakes for powerful PCs.

In the first part of the challenge the PCs interrupt the cultists during their ritual. In the second part of the challenge the PCs try to reach the Chained God’s aspect and destroy it before it awakens and calls forth Tharizdun.

lair-assault-7-coverSpoiler Warning! This Lair Assault is still active. If you plan to play it, do not read this article. This article is for DMs only. DMs should take the knowledge I’m sharing here and use it to make your sessions better and more enjoyable.

Throughout April Dungeon’s Master is participating in the Blogging from A to Z Challenge. The challenge is to write a new article ever day in April, excluding Sundays. That’s 26 articles over the course of the month. To make things even more interesting the title of each article will begin with a different letter of the alphabet. “L” is for Lair Assault as we review the final offering in this fantastic public play program in today’s post.

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D&D Encounters

Lair Assault: Round-Up and Podcasts

lair-assault-logoThe Lair Assault program provides power gamers with the chance to prove once and for all who’s the best of the best. Wizards designed killer adventures that challenge the most experienced gamer. When the players at my FLGS heard that such a thing existed they demanded that we play these adventures as quickly as possible and as often as possible. Although we’ve suffered a lot of TPKs along the way it’s been a thrilling program that’s met with great success in the Greater Toronto Area gaming community.

Every time we played Lair Assault we recorded the session. Some of the players found it useful to go back and listen to the games to see what they could do differently the next time through to improve their chances of victory. Others just enjoyed listening to the party fumble their way around a killer encounter. Today we’re sharing these podcasts for your listening pleasure.

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D&D Encounters DM Resources

Lair Assault and D&D Encoutners Tokens

If you’re like me you use minis instead of tokens. However, when it comes to Lair Assault a sheet of tokens is provided for each adventure. It gives the DMs tokens for all the monsters, special terrain features, mounts and even a few boats. After seven seasons of Lair Assault it’s an extremely versatile collection of tokens which is why (after numerous requests) we’ve finally got around to sharing them with you.

When it comes to D&D Encounters everyone brings their own character so there are no standard tokens. However, with most seasons DMs are provided with one of the generic token sheets. I always assumed they were identical until I looked a bit closer in preparation for this post. It seems that I’ve acquired three sets of generic token sheets over the seasons.

I’ve scanned the token sheets, front and back, for all seasons of Lair Assault as well as the three generic token sheets from D&D Encounters and presented them below for your convenience. Using these scans you can print them and create your own token library.

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D&D Encounters

It’s Here! – Lair Assault: Into the Pit of Madness

lair-assault-7-cover

Into the Pit of Madness is the very last Lair Assault. The program was cancelled. However, before it goes away we have one final offering. A level 10 extravaganza that players are sure to love despite its difficulty.

For the grand finale Wizards of the Coast provided an adventure that is likely to be the most difficult and challenging Lair Assault yet. The challenge is so immense that it requires PCs to be at the very top of the heroic tier – level 10 – to even have a chance of success. The fate of the world hangs in the balance ensuring that the Lair Assault program ends with a bang, one way or another.

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D&D Encounters

It’s Here! – Lair Assault: Temple of the Sky God

Lair Assault is designed to challenge the most experienced and hard-core D&D players and I have no doubt that season 6 will certainly live up to that reputation. The gimmick this time around is that most of the adventure takes place in the air with the PCs on the backs of flying mounts. Players who think they’re the best at D&D now have to demonstrate that mounted combat in three dimensions is something they can handle otherwise they’re in for a shock to the system and a TPK.

Lair Assault is part of Wizard of the Coast’s public play program. It’s the Top Gun of D&D where the best of the best can demonstrate just how good they are at the combat and tactical side of the game. Role-playing is practically non-existent in these adventures but that’s by design. In this case the DM is actively trying to kill the PCs. For once it really is DM vs. players. So come on out and show your DM that you really are as good as you claim.

The new season of Lair Assault runs from December 1 – February 28. Below I share some of the high-level details. I’ve tried to keep it as spoiler-free as possible. Some of my suggestions and observations may seem a bit on the nose but most of my points are pretty obvious or fairly common sense things so I don’t think you have anything to worry about. I’m certainly not going to give away anything that will give players an unfair advantage.

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D&D Encounters

Lair Assault Map Gallery

Last week we published the D&D Encounters Map Gallery which had pictures of every map from every season of D&D Encounters to date. Today we share the maps from Lair Assault.

Each Lair Assault is a specially designed dungeon delve that pits a party of five PCs against nearly impossibly odds. They adventures are designed to be challenging and there is a realistic expectation from the designers that many parties will suffer a TPK their first time through. In some cases the PCs only have a limited number of rounds to complete their objective, which of course adds another level of difficulty and complexity.

The maps for these adventures are often secret at the outset, but players are encouraged to replay the adventure using the knowledge they gained from their first time through. The maps are often simple and deadly; exactly what most DMs are looking for.

Some of the Lair Assault kits have included mini versions of the maps for the DM’s reference. Scans of these maps are posted below. When such maps were not provided I’ve resorted to photos of the poster map. I’ll continue to update this gallery as more Lair Assault adventures are released. I won’t post the current season’s map unless the PCs would normally have access to it at the adventure’s outset.

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D&D Encounters DM Resources

It’s Here! – Lair Assault: Kill the Wizard

In this Lair Assault you’re are part of a special Drow “murder squad.” Your team must travel to the surface and kill a Wizard. It sounds straight-forward enough but failure will have devastating consequences. The Wizard has created a construct that he plans to mass produce and then set loose throughout the Underdark. These constructs have one purpose: kill all Drow. Your job is to Kill the Wizard, destroy the prototype, and ensure that no one can recreate it. Simple, right?

Lair Assault is part of Wizard of the Coast’s public play program. It’s intended to provide a whole new kind of D&D experience. There is very little role-playing in these adventures (by design). They are extremely combat heavy and reward smart play and clever tactics. It’s a power-gamers dream.

Knowing the kind of players these adventures attract, Wizards has made them exceptionally difficult. They fully expect that some or all of the PCs will die the first time they try any new Lair Assault. In fact they said at the outset that they estimate 80% of all groups will suffer a TPK in their first run-through. With the gauntlet thrown down you have to decide if you’re brave enough (or dumb enough) to accept the challenge and try to Kill the Wizard.

This is the fifth season of Lair Assault and the second that is part of the Rise of the Underdark theme running through all Wizards of the Coast product lines right now. One thing that makes this installment unique is that the players get to play the bad guys in this adventure. Not only that, but as Drow every player at the table should watch his back because you never know if another member of the squad is going to stab you in the back.

The new season of Lair Assault runs from September 1 – November 30. (I realize it already started, but I didn’t get the materials until last week and I’ve needed time to get this report put together.) Below I share some of the high-level details. I’ll try to keep it spoiler-free. Some of my suggestions and observations may seem a bit spoiler-y but most of my points are pretty obvious or fairly common sense things so I don’t think you have anything to worry about. I’m certainly not going to give away anything that will give players an unfair advantage.

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