D&D Adventurers League Q&A

A few people in my area (Australia) have been asking about running D&D Adventurers League games. I’ve pulled out a few of the answers I’ve given for this article. Where can I play D&D Adventurers League games? The short answer is “anywhere”. The longer answer depends on the type of adventures. Adventures of the D&D Expeditions series must be played in public places, except for a couple that … Continue reading D&D Adventurers League Q&A

5E Encounter: The Stone Spider

I’m currently writing an adventure. I’ve no idea if I’ll eventually finish it and publish it or if inspiration will fail and I’ll throw it into the pile of incomplete blog entries I’ve written over the years. Anyway, I rather liked this encounter, so I thought I’d share it with you. This is for you, James Introcaso! The passage breaks apart here into a web … Continue reading 5E Encounter: The Stone Spider

On the Sword Coast Adventurer’s Guide

The Sword Coast Adventurer’s Guide is the first non-adventure book published by Wizards of the Coast for D&D 5th Edition since the core rulebooks. It’s an unusual book, as – unlike most of the campaign books released in the past – it is aimed primarily at players, not Dungeon Masters. This isn’t to say that Dungeon Masters won’t find it a useful book, but that it’s … Continue reading On the Sword Coast Adventurer’s Guide

Chris Perkins on upcoming D&D storylines and products

Chris Perkins gave a seminar at GameHole 2015 about Wizards’ future plans for D&D adventures and products. The Gaming and BS Podcast recorded the seminar and posted it. I’m very grateful to them! There were a lot of interesting topics covered in the seminar. I’ve written a summary of some of the key points below, although I may have misinterpreted some of what he said. … Continue reading Chris Perkins on upcoming D&D storylines and products

An Afternoon with Sword Coast Legends

As a break from my busy RPG and work schedule, I spent a bit of today playing through the default Sword Coast Legends campaign. I haven’t really gotten that far yet – I’m in Luskan, uncovering the plot against the guild at present – but I now have the experience of several hours playing the game. And I’m enjoying it. A lot more than I … Continue reading An Afternoon with Sword Coast Legends

5E Adventure Review: Cat & Mouse

Cat & Mouse is an adventure by Richard Pett set in Kobold Press’s Southlands setting. It’s written as an introductory adventure for that setting, for 4-6 first level characters. Players unfamiliar with the setting will likely be surprised by a few of the plot points, one of which involves a gnoll proposing marriage to a catfolk. I know I was! The adventure has an urban … Continue reading 5E Adventure Review: Cat & Mouse

5E Adventure Review: Caves of the Kobold Queen

Cut to the Chase Games ran a successful Kickstarter to bring the Wrath of the Kobolds trilogy of adventure modules to us. The first two adventures: Caves of the Kobold Queen and Curse of the Kobold Eye are now available through DriveThruRPG, as is a prequel adventure, Night of the Mad Kobold, which I reviewed a few weeks ago. This is a review of WK1: … Continue reading 5E Adventure Review: Caves of the Kobold Queen

Entering the Wilderness: Tracked Exploration

Although hex-based exploration was the dominant form of wilderness exploration in the early days of Dungeons & Dragons, a few adventures used a hybrid approach that drew on dungeon design. That is, they limited the ways that players could move between encounters. Occasionally they would be hard limits – the depiction of the Underdark in Descent into the Depths of the Earth was that way … Continue reading Entering the Wilderness: Tracked Exploration

5E Adventure Review: The Bards of Ur

Johua De Santo has written quite a few adventures by this point, and The Bards of Ur is the latest of his Patreon-supported games to see release. It’s a short adventure of 8 pages, and is apparently designed for mid-level adventurers, although I’m not quite sure what that means. Levels 5-10? Possibly. The concept behind the adventure is a good one: a group of mysterious … Continue reading 5E Adventure Review: The Bards of Ur

Entering the Wilderness: Exploration and Castles

Dungeons & Dragons play is traditionally divided into three environments: Dungeon, Urban and Wilderness. Of those three, the Dungeon is by far the easiest to prepare and run. The Wilderness, on the other hand, is something I find particularly challenging to DM. The early D&D booklets suggested using the map of Outdoor Survival (an Avalon Hill boardgame) to represent the wilderness just around the dungeon, … Continue reading Entering the Wilderness: Exploration and Castles