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IF burning down the house doesn't do anything towards the goals, then there's no XP to get, and no XP to "lose." So I agree with that part. My point was that, if the house is full of dangerous enemies, then burning it down definitely DOES do something towards the goals. It does a lot. Awarding...

I'm pretty shocked that Elmore went out before Caldwell -- both are great artists, from a similar era, but Caldwell's stuff always seemed to have a lot more cheesecake while Elmore's stuff has a nice balance of realism and style. Daniel Horne -- 9 Keith Parkinson -- 12 Jeff Easley -- 13 Clyde...

LOL, I don't want to discourage stupid actions, either. ;) So much of the advice on this thread sounds really punitive to me. "Deny them XP! Give them a bad reputation! Let them know they've screwed up the adventure and now the town will be destroyed! Nyaaaah!" This is boring to me. I seek a...

So, I definitely would give players XP for solving problems that are actually solved by burning down the house. Conversely, I give zero XP for unnecessary encounters. "Poke some orcs in the nose" might represent a challenging encounter... but if there's no reason for the PCs to do it, I don't...

What? Am I remembering something wrong? I've visited the Caves of Chaos a few times, and the impression that I got was that if you simply kicked the door down, you would aggro the entire place (well, one humanoid tribe, at least) and get cut to ribbons. Remember, "Bree-yark" is goblin for "TPK."

Totally real, non-rhetorical question from my players: Why don't we just burn the haunted house to the ground?

Feats and multiclassing both use odd-numbered ability scores. Dex: Used to break initiative ties. (I have a large group and it seems like we have to fall back to Dexterity scores to break initiative ties roughly every other combat.) Cha: Initial and maximum Loyalty score if you're using the...

This is cultural to the US (and presumably the UK, Canada, etc.). In other cultures and countries, they have different distributions; in some places, the median star rating for products and services is around 3/5.

Daniel Horne -- 13 Keith Parkinson -- 15 Jeff Easley -- 13 Larry Elmore -- 2 Clyde Caldwell -- 17 David Trampier -- 12

Daniel Horne -- 13 Keith Parkinson -- 15 Jeff Easley -- 18 Larry Elmore -- 4 Clyde Caldwell -- 18 David Trampier -- 14

I've never had a DM describe a +1 sword as bland and nondescript. It's usually at the very least "the fine blade has elven script, the ornate guard and hilt are gold, and there is a ruby in the pommel." That's more than enough flavor for me, so I voted for bonuses.

Draegn It can also be attached to an arquebus. Attaching a knife to a pistol is kind of a silly thing to do, but pistol-swords were a real thing, so if somebody wanted to build that, it would probably use the stats of a pistol or a longsword (depending on how you used it) which would effectively...

So, I discussed my campaign's firearms with my players, and now I am taking a slightly different tack. 1. The players pointed out that the tiny ranges on firearms are actually a meaningful balancing factor versus crossbows. 2. Another balancing factor is the inconvenience of your gunpowder...

Don't tell, show (well, do tell, but also show): 1. Have enemies flee or surrender, a LOT. Only a few kinds monsters should fight to the death (undead, constructs, summoned creatures); for the rest, they should stop fighting when they are reduced to half strength or so. You can make a formal...

I feel like psionics should, as you increase level, become more and more meta-gamey. The level 20 capstone is that you realize you're just a character in a role-playing game.

Daniel Horne -- 16 Keith Parkinson -- 19 Jeff Easley -- 19 Larry Elmore -- 7 Clyde Caldwell -- 17 David Trampier -- 20

Astral Diamonds. No, seriously, they were a unique D&D thing, and I thought it was cool that the most valuable gem was so rare it had to be mined on another plane of existence. And in the 5E treasure tables, the highest-value gems (diamonds, rubies, etc.) are worth 5,000 gp, so it would be easy...

Daniel Horne -- 18 Keith Parkinson -- 22 Jeff Easley -- 26 Larry Elmore -- 11 Clyde Caldwell -- 18 David Trampier -- 18