Ill Met in Ylraphon uses a lot of skill challenges (or a similar mechanic) in its text. I didn’t discuss them in the review, but the skill challenge is a form of mechanic that I dislike intensely, mainly because most people use it so badly! For those unfamiliar with the mechanic, the basic way is to describe a challenge as a sequence of skill checks, … Continue reading Problems with Skill Challenges
In the worlds of Dungeons & Dragons, there’s a place known as the Temple of Elemental Evil. Although it was originally situated on the World of Greyhawk, I’m sure it’s appeared on many self-created worlds over the years. In its most recent incarnation, a new Temple of Elemental Evil was built in the north-east of Faerun, in the Forgotten Realms. Here’s a very quick summary … Continue reading Thoughts on Elemental Evil
There’s a tendency in a lot of Dungeons & Dragons settings to have a vast number of deities. The World of Greyhawk and the Forgotten Realms are typical examples of such, with over fifty deities (not including non-human deities) described for each. Back in the day, I thought the Dragonlance setting had a small list of deities with a “mere” twenty-one! As I get older, … Continue reading Limiting the Pantheon
My happiest experience writing adventures for play in the D&D Adventurers League came courtesy of Robert Alaniz in 2017. He asked me to be one of a team (along with himself and Richard Jansen Parkes) to write the fourth (and final) trilogy of adventures set in Phlan for Baldman Games. On Good Friday, 2019, I finally had the chance to run the entire trilogy of … Continue reading Good Lord, Deliver Us! – Adventures in Phlan
Boxed text is used to provide an initial description of an encounter to the DM and players, with the intention that the DM read or paraphrase the information to the players. It has the following benefits: It alerts the DM and players to what’s important in the room. It conveys the author’s intention for the initial stages of the encounter. It can set a mood. … Continue reading On Using Boxed Text
Using one format for all types of adventures unchangingly is a problem. You want to adapt the format according to the style of adventure (investigation, exploration, combat-heavy, event-driven, etc.) When I look to describing a particular scene or encounter, I think there are a few key areas that should be present. I look for the following: An opening paragraph or boxed text that sets out … Continue reading Formatting Encounters
Here are two encounters from Waterdeep: Dungeon of the Mad Mage. Interestingly, they appear next to each other in the book. Which do you find easier to parse? In my case, it’s the first one. And it’s for a simple reason: the opening paragraph tells me what to expect in the room. For the second example, the empty classroom, my initial thought is that the … Continue reading Encounter Writing: Introductory Paragraphs and Room Descriptions
Some of my favourite Dungeons & Dragons encounters have consisted of a very simple challenge, but, because the adventurers didn’t have the right tools available to them, they needed to improvise and come up with another solution. Give me a stream with a slippery log over it or an open pit just too wide for all the characters to jump and I have a situation … Continue reading Exploration and Making the Mind Work
In just over a week, I’m going to start running Waterdeep: Dragon Heist as part of our regular D&D Adventurers League play at our local store. We’ll begin with a Session 0, where the players create their characters and I can set the ground rules of the campaign. I also have to make a few decisions of my own. The primary one is this: Which … Continue reading Waterdeep: Dragon Heist – Choosing the Villain
How often do your characters rest? Where do they rest? Do your characters always fight to the death? Further to my last article on the effects that the availability of healing has on the game, I was considering how other mechanics change the flow of the game. To some extent, the mechanics are elements of the old-style dungeon explorations that I still enjoy very much … Continue reading Wandering Monsters, Pursuit and Resting
