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Wintry Blast |
D&D is known for the three pillars of play: combat, exploration, social interaction (not necessarily in that order). Combat is by far the most well-covered pillar. We have countless pages of rules for combat in the Player's Handbook and the Dungeon Master's Guide. What's more, most of the standard character sheet is basically a rules document for navigating combat. Social interaction, in my view, is the second most well-covered pillar. We have a variety of skill checks, spells, and abilities to help us navigate interactions with guards, bartenders, nobility, and hostages.
Exploration, on the other hand, is a bit lacking. I find that both Survival and Nature checks rarely get used in games I participate in. If they do, they aren't nearly as consequential as a pivotal Athletics or Stealth check. This is where Challenge Accepted by Crit Academy shines! This supplement fills in the gaps in exploration by introducing Skill Challenges. Skill Challenges were a big part of 4e. They were despised by many, championed by few. The folks are Crit Academy fall into the champion column as they took the spirit of that 4e mechanic and improved upon it tremendously. To be fair, there are a few "social" challenges in the book, but most fall into the exploration column. I find the challenges within very inspiring. When I sit down to plan a gaming session, I often flip through Challenge Accepted to look for ideas. Depending on your style, you can run the challenges as presented, or tweak them to better fit your table. These challenges are not simple traps or obstacles that are overcome with one or two rolls. No, these challenges represent entire scenes that will prove fulfilling and memorable to your gaming group. I recently ran a home-brew campaign for my wife and a few of her friends. I used Challenge Accepted to essentially fill an entire 2-hour gaming session. Not long into the night, the characters encountered a terrible storm (I modified the "Blizzard" challenge to fit this scenario). The party eventually found refuge in what appeared to be an abandoned cave. As they rested, one of the characters noticed that the cave entrance disappeared. A "Magically Sealed Door" had trapped the characters inside. Suspense was high as they tried to undo the magic. Things were looking good, until a series of bad rolls resulted in a magical explosion that drew the attention of a Minotaur from deeper in the cave system. Once the Minotaur was defeated, the party had to find an alternative way out of the caves since the "Magically Sealed Door" was still in place. This is where the "Lost in the Forest" challenge became "Lost in the Tunnels." The party eventually made it out of those tunnels to find that the initial storm had passed. There was very little combat that night, but it was one of the most exciting, high tension sessions we've had. That's the beauty of Challenge Accepted. Typically, characters getting lost in a cave system would be a boring slog of random encounters and frustration. Instead, stakes were high and everyone at the table was invested in every roll and outcome. I was so impressed with the "Magically Sealed Door" challenge that I included a modified version of it in chapter 7 of Wintry Blast. Instead of a door, I moved the magically charged runes to the cover of a book containing important lore for the characters to discover. That's what's great about this hobby. We can build off of each other's ideas. Tweak, modify, reskin and roll. If nothing else, pick up this supplement (it's very reasonably priced) for the "Interrogation" challenge. What party doesn't at one point of another take a poor goblinoid hostage? Those scenes can often turn tropey or worse if not handled with expertise and care. The mechanics for navigating such a scene as presented in Challenge Accepted are well worth the cover price. Looking for more great resources? Checkout the Toolkit page where I've listed my favorite resources. Challenge Accepted is among them! Be sure to checkout the Crit Academy guys online at critacademy.com or on Twitter @critacademy.
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AuthorD&D 5e enthusiast. Creator on DMsguild. Supporter of creators, content and good times. Follow me on Twitter @rjquestgiver Archives
July 2021
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