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This blog is a bit dated (2015), but it analyzes a single Hackmaster combat session and concludes that fears almost kept them away from a system that made combat dynamic and exciting. It's worth a read, albeit a small sample size that isn't analyzed at higher levels where players generally have...

Hardness/weapon/spell immunity. I like the idea you need a +3 weapon or adamantine to effectively do anything to an iron golem or a demon lord. Makes monsters more like a puzzle rather than big bags of hit points to be whittled down, encouraging creativity imo. E.g., prior edition, player used...

Thanks all! Some good stuff to begin looking into!

Looking to craft a network of lost dwarven towns, forts and crossroads during a portion of our campaign wherein the party is tracking clues to follow someone through a vast network of a dwarven empire long ago overrun, connected once by a massive underground road system. If familiar with Dragon...

If a player specifically has abilities to talk to animals, etc., then we're going to have a lot more animals in my flavor descriptions. Otherwise, I like the "Bits of..." series of flavor text (100 or so for a terrain type) which often incorporate mundane animals (sometimes they're simply...

OOTA. Glabbagool. High level of cool traveling with a sentient gelatinous cube.

Way back in the original day, traps: (1) Gave the thief (rogue) a chance to have the spotlight. Only thieves could disable traps, which were often deadly enough that not bringing a thief to the dungeon was a risky proposition. Since rogues stunk (mostly) at combat, you'd see many parties with...

You've got access to a lot of Dungeon Masters, game designers, and hordes of players here. Go for it. Best thing, no downvotes.

There might be no secret. They may just get along with your personality, regardless of whether your map is a single trail with impassable sides or your bad guy is a work of art. Personally, I think DMs need to be disabused of the idea there's a "right" way to a good game, or if you want to call...

Alternately, don't make the adult giants a foe that can be defeated by conventional means. They might grunt in annoyance at physical attacks, have skulls too thick for mental magic to penetrate, and treat them like noisy children. If the party wants something to play with, maybe they carry some...

Thanks, got some solid ideas and rolling with 'em. I usually try to be a week ahead of my players, not a day!

So short notice, as I procrastinated at the end of a year-long Dragonlance campaign (wherein we ran the original modules converted, with Level Up for characters), the players made it to the finale. And, while I have the "as written" part, it's not the climatic ultra-conflict boss battle that I...

Made me think of the Knights of the Dinner Table comic, gamer spoof. All potions have expiration dates (often written on the bottle). If an expired potion is used, it triggers a roll similar to the mixing potions table. Poor characters could also buy expired potions. It was meant to be silly at...

Brainstorm: On a natural 20 critical hit, roll a d20. If you roll a 1, the sword instead explodes into a 10d6 fireball centered on the wielder. The wielder is immune to this damage, but the sword is destroyed and will reform randomly on some other plane in 1 year. It's 1 in 400, but since...

In a long-term celtic-themed Kingmaker campaign, I had a calendar with yearly holidays, giving folks notice in advance of the big ones such as Samhain (precursor to Halloween) where druids proclaimed new laws and the ruler of the lands (a gamer) was expected to do some ceremonies. They came to...

...in our last Dragonlance (5E converted) session, the party brought a Dragon Orb into the heart of Sanction, epicenter for the Dark Queen's armies...and when things were looking really bad, almost used it, then chickened out (because they know the orbs are insanely crazy to control, having used...

1. Curse of Strahd, DM. Needed some heavy modification for Strahd's personality (based off novels including I, Strahd) so that the diary and understanding his motivations become the key to overcoming him + mods for Ireena and some other major players + adding a 4th piece to the tarot equation to...

Not an educator, but I recall my old town and the gaming store cooperating with a private school that rewarded its middle-school students with a weekend D&D session, if they met particular goals. Always packed.

AD&D 2E Rogue's Gallery, yep (not the 1E version). Hole punched to easily be added to your monster manual giant binder.

Savage Tides (3E, Dungeon Magazine, campaign) starts with the story arc of a noble lady (and her wayward brother). If you weren't invested in that arc from Session 0, you really don't have a reason to invest in the early adventures. And, with a little touch up, it's a riveting, fantastic story...