Categories
DM Resources

Has Your Campaign Stalled? (Part 2)

Another week has passed and your players have packed up and left. You sit at the table and realize this session didn’t go any better than last week’s. You tried to change things up, but your players still left looking bored and you’re stressed.

You already tried the tips and suggestions we gave you the last time your campaign stalled and they just didn’t do the trick. You made sure you had tougher challenges and you changed the plot on your players. You even made your super-villain run away so he could live to fight another day. Still you can’t help but think that there was something more that you could have done.

Categories
Eberron Editorial

An Open Letter to Wizards of the Coast on the D&D Championship

Dear Wizards,

At this year’s GenCon I participated in my very first D&D Championship. My team did remarkably well and we advanced to the final round. Unfortunately we did finish in the top three and did not win any prizes. Looking back on my experience with the 2009 D&D Championship I have some feedback for you, and for anyone thinking of participating in this kind of event at future cons.

Categories
DM Resources Eberron Skill Challenges

Skill Challenge: Protect The Caravan

Gen Con is here and many loyal gamers flock to Indy on this annual pilgrimage I thought what better way to celebrate than a skill challenge about caravans.

Trade is an integral part of any society. The vital caravans that move goods from one area to another require protection. PCs are often called upon to provide this service. It allows the DM an easy way to move the PCs to a new location or introduce an adventure hook.

Categories
DM Resources

Game Starts In One Hour And You Aren’t Ready

Let’s face it we’re all busy. Real life has the annoying habit of being, well real. We need to deal with it and as a Dungeon Master sometimes that means our prep time for our weekly D&D sessions has to take a back seat. So what do you do when work, school, family, video games or any number of other things distract you from preparing your gaming session?

There are a number of solutions and while I won’t promise to cover anywhere near all of them, here are some options for smashing a game together on short notice.

Categories
DM Resources Eberron Skill Challenges

Skill Challenge: Find and Repair the Warforged Scout (Part 2)

In Find and Repair the Warforged Scout (Part 1) the PCs undertook a mission to scour a battlefield in search of the components of Obsidian, a Warforged scout thought destroyed during the war. Newly discovered information led some to believe that Obsidian was not completely destroyed and that with the right ritual he could be reactivated. If this happens information the scout possesses will be incredibly valuable and potentially damaging to very important people in many different nations.

Setup

Part 2 of the skill challenge begins after the PC recover the missing Warforged components. Now that they have the components they can attempt to put Obsidian back together and try to reactivate him. But this is delicate work that requires a coordinated effort from the entire party.

Categories
DM Resources Eberron Skill Challenges

Skill Challenge: Find and Repair the Warforged Scout (Part 1)

When a Warforged dies it isn’t always dead. This was especially true during the last war. Just because a Warforged was damaged and fell to the ground during combat didn’t necessarily mean that he was gone forever. It took time for living, breathing commanders to get used to the concept that some of their soldiers were constructs. When retreat was necessary and bodies were left behind on the battlefield, inactive Warforged were often abandoned along with the soon-to-be-rotting corpses. But in some cases the fallen Warforged could still be repaired, if only someone with the appropriate skills made the attempt.

Categories
Book Reviews Eberron Editorial

How to Get Your Eberron Fix

Everyone wants more Eberron. Today marks the official release of the Eberron Campaign Guide. If you haven’t yet checked out Eberron in 4e then today is a great time to start. We’ve got reviews of the two core books as well as materials to get a new DM ready for an Eberron campaign. Here are five suggested ways to get your Eberron fix.

Categories
Adventure Hooks DM Resources Humour

The Hangover: The Movie That Begs to Be a D&D Adventure

As a DM, I often draw inspiration for my D&D games from the most unexpected places. This weekend I saw the movie The Hangover and afterwards I realized that the way the story is structured would work beautifully as a D&D game. For those readers who haven’t seen the movie, I won’t present anything in this article that will ruin it for you. The high points that I’m going to cover are all revealed in the trailer.

Categories
DM Resources Eberron Skill Challenges

Skill Challenge: Negotiations

The Eberron campaign setting comes with all the intrigue of a post war setting and all the mistrust of a setting still stuck in a cold war. During such difficult times the PCs may find themselves involved in tense negotiations where a poor resolution could result in renewed hostilities.

Categories
Editorial

Poll Results

Ever since we launched Dungeon’s Master we’ve included a poll question on the right side of the page. (If you haven’t answered this week’s question, now would be a good time!) The number of respondents for each poll continues to grow along with the number of readers who visit our site regularly. Now that we’re a few months in and we’ve had the opportunity to ask a variety of questions of our readers, we decided to take a look at the results of a few polls.