Out Now on the DMs Guild
Wintry Blast |
During the #PlayItForward event on the DMs Guild I picked up a number of titles. Among them, Legendary Bestiary from Christopher Walz, Christian Eichhorn, and Alex Clippinger. I'm so glad I did!
This supplement is amazing in a number of ways:
Allow me to elaborate. We've all ran encounters with a "leader" among minions. Think of Yeemik from Lost Mine of Phandelver as one example. This goblin boss doesn't get any special abilities in the adventure other than he has max hit points. That is boring. Very boring. It's one thing to give a goblin max hit points (from the standard 7 to 12). It's another entirely to give max hit points to an ogre chief (59 to 91). What a slog! When I run combats, particularly one's where there might be some potential roleplaying opportunities, I typically make one monster the defacto leader. Come across some hobgoblins in the wood? One of them is the interesting one, the others are background actors. Come across bandits on the road? Same deal. Often times I name these "special" NPCs just in case my characters ask or engage them with dialogue. My new rule after picking up Legendary Bestiary? If I name a low level NPC, its getting legendary actions. You can also grant legendary actions to "legendary" creatures. Is there an old, fabled owlbear living in the forest? Spice it up and make it unique from the general run-of-the-mill owlbear. This supplement covers all creatures from the Monster Manual that fall in the CR 1 to 3 range. The legendary actions found within add flavor and personality to your creatures. It adds a little something extra to your combat and keeps your players on their toes. Experienced players can easily metagame (accidentally or not) when they face a familiar foe. These extras abilities will keep them guessing. The extra abilities aren't game breaking, either. As long as you use them wisely, your encounters go from "Medium" to "Deadly" by incorporating this supplement at your table. Here's one example using that ogre I mentioned earlier: Angry Idiot. The ogre makes a melee weapon attack against a target that used words the ogre cannot understand (such as casting a spell with verbal components or speaking in an unknown language) this round. I find that fun! It makes the ogre boss more than a simple sack of hit points like the rest of his clan. You can also add these abilities to pets of your higher level monsters. Let's say you have a CR 9 evil druid as the big bad for your campaign. Maybe that druid has a pet direwolf, but this direwolf has been trained to destroy armor: Sunder Armor. The wolf tears away at an enemy’s armor, creating an opening for the pack. The wolf makes a melee weapon attack against a creature wearing nonmagical armor. The attack does not deal damage, but the nonmagical armor takes a permanent and cumulative −1 penalty to the AC it offers. The armor is destroyed if the penalty reduces its AC to 10. Suddenly, the combat gets a lot more interesting. I wish I had this supplement while writing Wintry Blast. I definitely would have worked in some of these concepts. As I said earlier though, it's super easy to implement Legendary Bestiary at your table for encounters that are already written. Get it today. Use it at your next game. Looking for more great resources? Checkout the Toolkit page where I've listed my favorites. Legendary Bestiary is definitely among them!
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Anne Gregersen is my hero. Let me explain. Anne has cooked up a series of amazing supplements on the DMs Guild dealing with monster loot. We aren't talking about loot in the traditional sense (gems, coins, and trinkets). No, we are talking about harvested loot from creatures the adventurers fell in battle. We are talking about venom sacks, talons, scales, and the like.
If your D&D groups are anything like mine, there is always at least one person who wants to collect snake fangs or fashion a luxurious cloak out of a dire wolf pelt. I always struggled with how to handle these player requests. A Nature check? Medicine? Survival? I usually just ended up hand-waving it so we could move the story along without getting bogged down in the nitty-gritties of field dressing and taxidermy. The problems didn't stop there. Several sessions later, I'd have characters asking what they can do with the parts they harvest. Again, I was often at a loss. This is where Anne saves the day. She has created a rules system that is simple enough to implement, complex enough to be interesting, and rewarding for everyone involved. Her system includes a new item, harvester's tools, and mechanics for breaking down different types of creatures. For example, Nature checks are used when harvesting from Beasts, Dragons, Plants and other creature types. Religion is used when harvesting from the Undead, Celestial, and Fiends. Survival and Arcana checks also come in to play for various creature types. Anne has also accounted for creature size. Harvesting from a giant boar and a green dragon are two totally different endeavors. Your typical medium creature takes an hour to harvest, while that huge hydra takes 4 hours. Regardless of the time commitment, only one check is required. On a successful check, the characters get all the prescribed loot available. On a failed check, they get half. On a severely failed check, a mishap may occur (like piercing an acid gland or slicing open their own thumb). The amazing thing is that Anne has taken the time to assign loot to every creature found in the Monster Manual, Xanathar's Guide to Everything, and Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes. There is a supplement available for each source book on the DMs Guild, or you can purchase them as a bundle. Mundane creatures like wolves and bears don't have very exciting loot, but once you get to gricks, basilisks, black puddings, and so on, the loot gets fun. For example, that back pudding yields vials of "ooze goop" that can be thrown to deal acid damage. Other creatures, like the young remorahaz, yield hide that can be crafted into gear. In the case of the remorhaz, characters can fashion a cloak that grants fire and cold resistance when worn. Of course, there are costs associated with this crafting (time and money), so you party can't start using the items without spending some downtime first. And that leads me to the icing on the cake. Many players love acquiring magic items. It's so much more rewarding to have them craft items out of collected materials then simply trying to purchase them in every town they visit. What's more, many of the items included in Anne's supplements are consumable or appropriately powered. The characters won't be able to fashion a +3 Vorpal Sword from collecting just the right parts. We also know that 5e has a money problem. Characters acquire vast wealth and have nothing really to spend it on. Anne's system helps solve that problem. That remorhaz cloak I mentioned? It takes 3,000 gp to fashion. That's the type of item that is perfect for filling in the narrative between campaigns. I can't recommend these supplements enough. Druids and Rangers will love harvesting from nature and leaving nothing to waste. Wizards will love collecting samples to help them in their research. Rogues always love finding a good source of poison. Even a Barbarian can find joy in finally putting some clothes on while showing off a trophied-fur from their epic kill. There's no better time to get this bundle since the DMs Guild has their #PlayItForward event going on. Between May 4 and May 17, 2020, 100% of the royalties go directly to content creators like Anne. If you have stuff sitting in your cart or languishing on a wishlist, go get it now! Monster Loot Products
PS. She even has smaller supplements specifically for adventures like Lost Mine of Phandelver and Descent into Avernus. This is the second of the six custom-made magic items for my new adventure, Wintry Blast. While the Ring of the Fiery Covenant was inspired by combining two Magic cards together, this sword was the result of a single card. In that single, simulated pack of Ice Age that I used as the basis for this entire adventure, I pulled the card Rally. Rally is an interesting card in that it ONLY appears in Ice Age. So many other cards get reprinted in a later set (some dozens of times), but not this one.
As I mentioned in my previous post, I like to consider the whole card when I'm trying to convert it into a D&D element. While the mechanics and flavor text of Rally are purely defensive in nature, the word rally inspires something offensive. I didn't find a use for this card in my adventure until I got to the point of needing loot for the dragon's hoard (in case the cover of Wintry Blast doesn't give it away, there's a dragon involved). I was acutely aware that I had yet to plant any magical weapons in my adventure. What better time to take care of a few birds with a single stone? The inspiration for this sword's mechanics came partly from bardic inspiration and partly from the battle master's maneuvers. I've played both a bard and a battle master and I know how rewarding it is to assist your party with a little extra nudge. I also know that the thrill of a critical hit or landing a devastating spell can inspire (or rally) the players at the table. Just when people may be souring on an encounter going poorly, the dice fall their way and shift the momentum. That's what this sword represents. The art for this sword was created by the amazing Dean Spencer. Check out his work at DriveThru RPG or on his Patreon page. You can also find him on Twitter @DeanSpencerArt. My new adventure, Wintry Blast, was inspired by opening up a single, simulated pack of Ice Age, a Magic: the Gathering set that came out way back in 1995. Each one of those 15 cards is represented in the adventure in one way or another. Two of those cards, Circle of Protection: Red and Fire Covenant merged together to create one of the six custom-built magic items included in this adventure: the Ring of the Fiery Covenant.
When using Magic cards as inspiration, I like to look at the whole card: the mechanics, the name, the art, the flavor text. I also like to utilize existing D&D 5e mechanics and abilities as much as possible. When I saw the Circle of Protection in my pack I instantly knew there would be an item granting fire resistance in my adventure. Since circles are round and rings are round, a ring of resistance was the obvious choice. Rings of resistance, however, are a bit boring in my opinion. I wanted to jazz up this basic magic item with something extra. That's where Fire Covenant comes in. This card, in Magic terms, essentially allows you to pay life to deal damage to creatures. The cleric/wizard spell, Life Transference came to mind. This 5e spell lets you heal someone by sacrificing damage, but the broad strokes are similar; it's a cost-benefit proposition. After a bit of noodling, this is the final product I came up with. Ring of the Fiery Covenant Ring, rare (requires attunement) You have resistance to fire damage while wearing this ring. Additionally, once per day when you score a hit with any weapon or spell, you may choose to take 10 points of fire damage (reduced to 5 due to the resistance) to deal an extra 10 fire damage. At level 5, you can choose to take 20 points of fire damage (reduced to 10 due to the resistance) to deal an extra 20 fire damage. That's it, a little peek behind the curtain of how Wintry Blast came to be. I look forward to sharing more of the process and particulars in future posts. Thanks for reading! Recently, I've been struggling with gridded combat. It's not that I don't know how to do it, or that I don't understand how to count 5-foot squares, it's that I'm over it. With COVID-19 having us all on lock down, I'm missing two of my three regular D&D games. Those two games are the ones that met in person and used theater of the mind combat. The other game, the one that is still going, meets on Roll20 and naturally uses gridded combat as that is one of the main features of that platform.
So why am I over it? I think the grid distracts too much from the creativity of the game. I feel the game turns into a war-strategy game, not a role playing game. What's more, the DM is stuck having to track those tokens, measure movement, size area-of-effect spells, and the like. I've been on both sides of this Roll20 headache, as a player and as a DM. The tools are great, but they can just as easily detract from that game as add to it. Now I'm no Luddite. I use an iPad at the table when DMing. I've embraced (slowly) the merits of D&D Beyond, and I've learned a whole host of techy things in writing Wintry Blast. This isn't a bash on Roll20, I love Roll20. If it wasn't for Roll20 I'd have no current D&D game at all. I also wouldn't be able to stay in touch with far flung friends over dice and drinks. This post is a bash on gridded combat, regardless whether it is online or at a physical table. Zipperon Disney has a great video on his YouTube channel all about the merits of theater of the mind. In that video he talks about a lot of interesting concepts, among them, the use of conjunctions. If it's been a minute since elementary school, we're talking about the words AND, OR, and BUT. Zipperon challenges us to use these conjunctions in adjudicating player actions. One example from the video, "You can run up to the bugbear chief, BUT you'll take an opportunity attack from the goblin on the way by." This is a perfect example of allowing your players agency, while at the same time imposing consequences. When I run theater of the mind combat I'm very abstract with distances and positioning. If a player wants to do something, I usually let them, but I'll impose a catch just like the opportunity attack example above. I find this approach improves pacing, limits meta-gaming, and results in more organic game-play. If you need a good example of theater of the mind combat, read any of the Drizzt novels by R.A. Salvatore. In those books, the author expertly navigates the complexities of combat with fluidity and tempo. He never gets bogged down in the mechanics of combat, it's all story. Our games can strive to capture that. Zipperon goes on to say in that video, "...rather than think of themselves as a referee in a war game, DMs should think as themselves as a director in an action movie." Exactly. Take 9 minutes, go watch that video. If you are a DM, I have no doubt that you'll get plenty of inspiration from it. If you are a player, you can incorporate some of these principles the next time your roll for initiative. Think like an action star, not like a chess piece. Looking for more great resources? Checkout the Toolkit page where I've listed my favorite resources. Zipperon Disney's YouTube channel is among them! Be sure to check him out on Twitter too, @zipperondisney. 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. |
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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