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Every so often I'll meet a new GM who is just getting into Dungeon Fantasy or GURPS DF, and who is struggling to figure out how to "read" monster difficulty from stat blocks. I remember being one of those GMs not too long ago even. Unlike D&D, DFRPG stat blocks don't come labeled with a metric...

Motivation and problem statement: WotC's 20th level Vecna adventure (Free Level 20 D&D Adventure: Face Off Against Vecna in an Epic Battle in 'Don’t Say Vecna!') is kind of terrible, but I want to use it anyway as an onboarding ramp to teach D&D players how to play Dungeon Fantasy, not least...

The Alexandrian has a post that I agree with, Whither the Dungeon? – The Decline and Fall of D&D Adventures. Excerpt: I’ve talked in the past about how D&D 5th Edition doesn’t teach DMs how to run dungeons. In fact, it doesn’t even teach them how to key a dungeon map (or provide an example of a...

I'm excited about Eero Tuovinen's new book "Muster - A Primer for War. Advice for playing D&D the wargaming way!" (Muster - Arkenstone Publishing | DriveThruRPG.com) and want to share my first impressions and ask for yours. I'm not much of an art guy normally but the art immediately grabbed me...

I made a saving throw analyzer, hope you like it: Shining Sword: Saving throw analyzer P.S. Apologies, the Javascript file is extremely large (9 MB) so it might not work great on a phone. I suggest using it desktop/laptop only. Edit: it's an interactive visualizer to help you see patterns in...

The DMG, as well as the Basic Set, contains some self-contradictory guidance on adventuring days. There's a little section which reads: The thing is, the table that they give doesn't actually match the language in that first paragraph about "six to eight medium or hard encounters in a day." I...

I've been imagining all this time that a creature could only be affected once by a given Symbol. But the spell text actually just says: Once triggered, the glyph glows, filling a 60-foot-radius sphere with dim light for 10 minutes, after which time the spell ends. Each creature in the sphere...

Here's an idea I wouldn't mind discussing with someone: Features like the Battlemaster's Relentless, the Monk's Perfect Self, and the bard capstone give you something "whenever you roll initiative." There are obvious problems with this kind of rule, from the fact that it incents PCs to start...

Assume that a player has been sidelined with nothing to do for an extended period. (His PC is out of commission, or the party is split, and the DM isn't involving the player in some other way.) If the player excuses himself from the game session to e.g. go watch a movie with his girlfriend, is...

Say you're a 13th level Necromancer. Ever since 6th level you've been running around with a handful of skeleton archers (let's say you're up to an even two dozen, even though that's a bit on the large side IME), re-casting Animate Dead on them every single day as part of your daily routine, and...

Let's say your DM is writing a module for distribution, whether via DM's guild or via friends or some other method. He's billed this module as "suitable for 4-5 PCs of levels 7-9." He's had a couple of other DMs run the module once or twice, and he's run it himself for two different groups, one...

Semi-idle thought experiment: if you were playing AD&D as a player (not a DM), what would you miss about 5E? What bits would you think worth keeping or importing? For me, I like the 5E fighter and the number of combat options he has. Some of the 5E fighter actions like Disarm have analogues in...

I found this useful and want to recommend it: http://www.jamisbuck.org/presentations/rubyconf2011/#title-page It has some thought-provoking observations on mazes which are obviously relevant to any game designer or DM creating a dungeon or other maze in his game. Naturally, as a DM, you don't...

By the rules as written, a bard is able to do an absurd number of things with his mouth all at once. He can cast a spell with verbal components and his flute as a magical focus WHILE ALSO composing and reciting an inspiring ditto to bolster his comrades' performance (Bardic Inspiration) WHILE...

[Remarks: with this variation, you gain some potential synergies that in some ways make a fighter/mage more powerful than a fighter and a mage working together. For instance, you can wear heavy armor and cast a Blur spell and Shield when hit, which is more than twice as good as either heavy...

I made a little tool that you can use to generate backstories for characters that start above first level: https://maxwilson.github.io/Beast/AbstractDungeoneering/ Source code is here: https://github.com/MaxWilson/Beast Screenshot: If your PC is killed, you roll up a new one. Might be nice...

If a Githyanki Knight fought a Githzerai Zerth to the death (or to the pain), who would win? The Knight is CR 7, has a higher attack bonus (+9 vs. +7), slightly more HP (91 vs. 84), and a higher AC (18 vs. 17). He has a Telekinetic attack which targets the Zerth's weak point (Strength checks)...

Thread RENAMED "Concurrent initiative" for clarity because "Simultaneous initiative" was confusing/misleading From another thread: Response: Ambushes don't add much complexity, so let's leave the ambush part in there. The basic rules I use are pretty simple: declare actions in order of Int...

What does it mean when I get a notification like this? "10:24 AM - Jeff Albertson quoted Hemlock in post Hidden" Read more: http://www.enworld.org/forum/member.php?6787650-Hemlock&tab=thanks#ixzz4ULyTOw7f Why am I being quoted in a thread that I can't even see? Why does Enworld notify me...

Hypothetically speaking, what do you think would happen to the game if the Champion's 3rd level ability were the ability to score crits on any roll of 17-20, and his 15th level ability was to score crits on 13-20? Would (Half-Orc?) Champions suddenly become all the rage? The "autohit" effect...