#D&D

[veryimportantpeopleshow]

Vic Michaelis - born for journalism, forced to watch @dimension20official

Watch the new episode now on Dropout

[bea-n-art]

Gale of Waterdeep's Lanceboard is set, about to recite their demise. Support a tiny artist, Tip Jar: https://ko-fi.com/beanart Get this as a wall print: https://www.inprnt.com/gallery/beanart Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/beatenossart Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/beatenoss.bsky.social

[magneto666666]

I bet half of my players had a similar urge during some of the Tier 4 combat sessions with 12+ enemies.

Found that over at mastodon

[oldschoolfrp]

The "Feudal Mind" spell, Will McLean, Dragon 17, August 1978 -- While it's a bit of an exaggeration to say knights always had total disregard for the lives of the lower classes, there are enough documented accounts of conflicts between allied mounted and foot troops, and out of control charges & retreats, to perpetuate the stereotype.

[ohnohon]

I am unfortunately obsessed with the bad man himself

🚩red flag daddy aka Strahd von Zarovich 🚩

[onioned]

Burying my face in his boobies.... I love him forever

[official-dnd-posts]

ghoul, medium undead (cr 1)

official dnd post

[dailyadventureprompts]

Ally: Embry & Asher of the Royal Commission

artsource

It's a lonely life being a cartographer in service to the crown, but Embry Mharkos wouldn't trade it for anything. Tasked with sketching out the region's peaks, river systems, and outlying settlements, he'll gladly join the party for a chance to see the sights. In addition to picking up the bill for provisions and pointing them towards points of gossip,  Embry will take over the logistics of running the party’s camp and use his geographical knowledge to help plan routes through the wilds.

Before you ask, yes, the dog has guild accreditation. What are you going to do about it? In reality, Embry used to travel with a man named Ashar, a senior surveyor and rather unplesant drunk who fudged his findings and took a rather predictable fall off a cliff after failing to secure his belaying line. Embry was just going to report his death to the commission field office when a random stray began following him through town. Thinking about all the provisions TWO paychecks could provide, he claimed to be taking over paperwork for his old partner and started forging Ashar's already illegible signature. He doesn't really think of it as lying, Asher's been with him far longer than the old man was, and he makes for a much better conversation.

Adventure Hooks:

Knowing the party for the dungeon delving thrillseekers they are, one of the first places the cartographer is going to point them towards one of the most impressive local delves: The skeleton of an ancient dragon half impaled on the peaks of a nearby mountain.

There's an isolated settlement of orcs Embry has wanted to make contact with for a while, since they've had decades to map the territory's outermost wilderness. Sadly last time he got close he made a rather bad impression on one of their hunting parties, who thought his scouting the precursor to some kind of attack on their territory. Perhaps the party can help him smooth things out, maybe by making some kind of gift to the village elders?

One night Asher starts barking and making a general racket, going as far as to drag one of the party out of their tent by the sleeping bag before running off into the darkness. The source of his distress? The distant cries of a fellow traveller bound to the trunk of a tree, left to die of exposure by a cult operating out of a nearby village. Asher was nearly sacrificed by the cult when he was a pup, and has gained a sixth sense when it comes to detecting their influence.

After the party have gotten to know him a bit (or gotten nosey with the coded letters he's always writing in addition to his usual map sketches), he'll reveal to them that he's been on a secret mission the entire time they've known him: In addition to his duties as a surveyor, Embry is an agent of the local marquess, who's convinced her husband is involved in some kind of scheme and sent him along with a few others to investigate. More than a few of the rumours he's had them check out were pretenses to this spycraft,

[vintagerpg]

Oh, hey, Vecna. I find it strange how the arch-lich looms so large in the history of D&D. His artifacts — hand, eye — first appeared in Eldritch Wizardry, the creation of Brian Blume. His first real appearance in the game was in this, WGA4: Vecna Lives (1990). It’s interesting.

It is very much in the mode of ’90s, focusing on the story unfurled through a series of interconnected, predetermined Events. There’s some dungeoning and city exploration, but the scenario is far more focused on investigation and explosive narrative happenings. It is not connected to the Falcon modules, though it builds on their use of the City of Greyhawk. Nor does it meaningfully connect to the imminent shake-up of the setting’s status quo that plays out in Wars andFrom the Ashes (though if the players fail to defeat the lich, the note on the resulting horrors of Vecna’s rule do seem to anticipate what actually happens to the world after Iuz triumphs).

I’m not sure in sum the adventure is worth the squeeze, though there are interesting bits. For starters, players take the roles of high level pregens: members of the sorcerous Circle of Eight and their associates. Vecna’s key henchmen are pretty fantastically weird — a humanoid with an eye for a head, and another with a hand-head. That it’s kind of…obvious and cartoonish, maybe, but then Ken Frank’s illustrations really sell the concept for me. They’re great and horrible and I would totally use them elsewhere. Third, I really like this Greyhawk that is full of standing stones and dangerous myths. Gygax tends to get all the credit for making Greyhawk an interesting place, but I don’t think it actually becomes interesting until around now, and I think it is ironic that Zeb Cook, who many at the time viewed as a great Gygax betrayer, was instrumental in this. Oh, and Easley’s cover is pretty great, too.

Vecna, defeated, at least in “canon,” winds up it Ravenloft for a while, and gets a big adventure at the end of that line’s lifespan, Vecna Reborn, but I’ve never read it. Nor have I read Die, Vecna, Die!, which ushered in the transition from 2E to 3E, much the same way as Eve of Ruin did for 5E (I guess that parallel depends on whether you think D&D Forever or whatever they are calling it is a new edition or not).

I don’t really understand where this idea that Vecna is one of the great D&D villains came from, though. He achieves far less than Iuz and even Acererak seems more accomplished. He keeps popping up in sourcebooks across 3E and 4E, but he only really amounts to anything in a Critical Role storyline (is that canon?) and as the source of a nickname for a villain in Stranger Things? I dunno, gimme Strahd any day. 

[divinedice]

Blood Vows, Bonechill, and Underdark are all on sale still! I've moved them over to my Ko-fi.

They're heavily discounted at $40 each as a clearance sale.

Blood Vows | Bonechill | Underdark

[mrprofdrhoff]

Fire; inflicts a burning DoT debuff. Burning gets worse if hit with this one again, but cancels out when hit by the Ice ray.

Ice; inflicts a frozen debuff that locks you in place until you break free. The ice melts if hit by the Fire ray.

Lightning; zaps you and knocks you prone. For the next turn, all metal projectiles fly towards you.

Poison; inflicts the poisoned status.

Acid; has a chance to melt your equipment.

Blood Boiler; literally boils your blood. This cures the Poison ray effects.

Light; blinds you. You are immune if already blind.

Thunder; deafens and mutes you. You are immune if already deaf.

Hallucination; every enemy on the battlefield now looks and sounds like an ally, and every ally now looks and sounds like an enemy. You are immune to either the audio or visual effects if you are deafened or blinded respectively.

Sureshot; a beam the diameter of an actual laser that pierces through any and everything with no opposition.

I like the idea of a player jumping in front of a beam thinking it will cure their burning or poison, only to get one of the other ones.

Game design exercise: You've been tasked with creating a non-trademark-infringing version of the beholder. The design brief specifies that your version should have ten creepy eyestalks with ten distinct magic powers, like the standard beholder, but these powers must not overlap with even one of the standard beholder powers.

For the purpose of this exercise, assume that the forbidden list consists of exactly the ten magic eyeball powers that are present in the Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition Monster Manual. (i.e., you don't need to research every magic eyeball power that's ever been attributed to a beholder in every iteration of D&D ever published.)

For reference, these ten powers are:

Controls your mind

Paralyses you

Makes you afraid

Slows you down

Makes you weak

General purpose telekinesis

Puts you to sleep

Turns you to stone

Disintegration ray

Just fucking kills you

These are all off limits.

So:

What ten magic eyeball powers do you give your legally-not-a-beholder?

[seawaveleo]

a time to mourn and a time to dance

[shamerli]

comm for Sindri

[iamliquid]

Batfamily Dungeons and dragons classes!

Bruce: Paladin or Monk

Why? Oath of vengeance. If not Paladin, I have a strange feeling that he'd be a Monk

Dick: Bard or Cleric

Why? I don't know.

Jason: Warlock

Why? Necromancer.

Tim: Artificer or Monk

Why? He probably would love to make and create items.

Damian: Barbarian or Rouge or Druid

Why? As of now and my current perception of Damian, he'd probably go Assassin route or angry bonk guy.

Cassandra: Rouge or Ranger

Why? I don't know either

Duke: Sorcerer or just a normal Fighter

Why? No idea

[ironwoman18]

I love this kind of thing, they inspired me to write something... I might do it ☺️😜🤔

Edit: Here's the link⬇️

bastard münchen game night ⚔️