Lysa Chen’s Ruins of Hisari is a D&D Adventurers League-legal adventure set in one of the many ruined locations in Chult. Although intended for a party of Tier 3 characters – that is, levels 11-16 – the first section of the adventure doesn’t contain many dangerous threats, and the outskirts of the ruins can quite easily be explored by a Tier 2 party. Then the … Continue reading 5E Adventure Review: Ruins of Hisari
I’m fascinated by the new subclasses in Xanathar’s Lost Notes to Everything Else. In fact, most new class designs fascinate me, although actually evaluating them? It’s hard. You need to playtest them. As it happens, the element of D&D that will see more play than anything else after the basic systems are the character classes. An individual spell that goes wrong can be easily excluded. … Continue reading Examining a Subclass: Path of the Courageous Heart
One of the interesting innovations of the DMs Guild and Wizards of the Coast this year has been to elevate the work of a group of skilled designers. Titled the “Guild Adepts”, these designers have had early access to upcoming D&D products, and have crafted supplementary products. The latest of these releases is Xanathar’s Lost Notes to Everything Else, an 87-page pdf that covers a … Continue reading Xanathar’s Lost Notes to Everything Else – A First Look at the Subclasses
Expanding on my recent article on how I run D&D combat without miniatures, here are a few notes on how I run terrain in that mode. It’s a different experience from using miniatures, and certain types of terrain change from being obstacles to the players to being opportunities instead. Choke Points – Doors, Archways, Corridors These are the narrow places where only one or two … Continue reading Terrain of the Mind
Did you know that bears have trouble fitting through doors? That was what we learned this session of D&D! The session began with the adventurers on their way to Eelstead, a frontier outpost in the land of Chult, where the adventurers’ guide, the lizardfolk Lungan, feared that something bad had happened. The journey to Eelstead, a 50-mile hike through the tropical jungle of Chult, would … Continue reading Tomb of Annihilation (Return of the Lizard King) – Part 3
After the adventurers arrived in Chult through a misfiring teleportation spell that had brought them via the Feywild, they were surprised to find themselves in the middle of a battle between some lizardfolk and some dinosaurs. They were even more surprised when their wizard dropped dead, as the magic that had revived him in the Feywild no longer worked. And surprise was no longer even … Continue reading Tomb of Annihilation (Return of the Lizard King) – Part 2
I run most of my Dungeons & Dragons games as Theatre of the Mind; that is, I don’t use miniatures. This does not imply that we end up using a lot of description to enliven the combats. In fact, my groups tend to be brutally efficient about most of them, except for the odd combat where we decide to put more effort into it. I … Continue reading A Quick Word on Theatre of the Mind
I’m currently writing a Convention-Created-Content adventure for premiere next year. It also happens to be an investigation. Yes, two things I’d never thought I’d do. Investigations are tremendously popular as D&D Adventurers League scenarios, but they’re very different to the D&D scenarios I grew up with. Those scenarios involved some wilderness travel and a lot of fighting monsters in a dungeon, perhaps with some interesting … Continue reading The Joy and Frustrations of Investigations
Underworld Speculation is a two-hour adventure for level 1-4 characters, designed by Chris Lindsay of Wizards of the Coast for use in stores as the Introductory Adventure for Xanathar’s Guide to Everything. It is a D&D Adventurers League legal adventure. And it’s fun. Really, really fun. The adventure comes with six pregenerated characters of level 3 that were built using options from Xanathar’s Guide to … Continue reading 5E Adventure Review: Underworld Speculation
The Donjon is the eleventh adventure of the Curse of Strahd season of the D&D Adventurers League. A four-hour adventure for character levels 5-10 written by Ash Law, it has the adventurers rescuing the leader of an orc tribe from a slither of yuan ti serving a dracolich. If you were wondering what this has to do with the ongoing storyline for Curse of Strahd, … Continue reading 5E Adventure Review: The Donjon
