Icewind Dale: Rime of the Frostmaiden is out! And immediately, the main thing some of my good friends have focused on is the difficulty of one of the opening quests. This quest pits the characters – quite likely four level 1 adventurers – against a Challenge 3 opponent. Usually, this would outrage me. I have a low tolerance for narratively-required encounters where there is a … Continue reading How Difficult is “Too Difficult”?
Play in my Sunday night Waterdeep Dungeons & Dragons campaign has been somewhat erratic of late, as real life shows lots of ways it can intrude. Our previous session saw the group head north from Waterdeep to deal with a threat at Black Marble Quarry, as I mentioned in my review of that product. That saw some incredibly reckless actions from the paladin that resulted … Continue reading Waterdeep Tales: To Helm’s Hold
Exploring Eberron is the new 240+ page sourcebook from Keith Baker (and company) that expands on Eberron lore, now available on the DMs Guild as a PDF or Print-on-Demand hardcover. This article is one of a series looking at the contents of the book. I am uncomfortable with calling it a “review” as I have not used the material in play; instead, these are my … Continue reading A Look at Exploring Eberron, part 4: Uncharted Domains
Something present in older forms of Dungeons & Dragons that has not survived into the current edition is the destruction of magic items by various effects the party might suffer in combat. In AD&D and original D&D, when you were hit by a fireball spell, every item you had was required to make a saving throw (with success values determined by a special Item Saving … Continue reading Destroying the Players’ Magic Items
My home Dungeons & Dragons group have finished the Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth and are now heading south in search of the third section of the Rod of Seven Parts, but they stopped along the way to kill a white dragon. That is all Mike “Sly Flourish” Shea’s fault. In Sly Flourish’s Fantastic Adventures, he placed a suit of armour that could detect white dragons. … Continue reading Adventures in Greyhawk – Hunting the White Dragon
Death at Black Marble Quarry is a one-session adventure for level 5 characters. The characters must investigate a quarry where the miners (quarrymen?) have uncovered an ancient temple. Unfortunately for the workers, this let loose the undead trapped within, and the quarry workers were all killed. Enter the PCs – they need to enter the quarry, explore the old temple, and end the threat. There … Continue reading 5E Adventure Review: Death at Black Marble Quarry
In the early days of Dungeons & Dragons, a lot of details of traps were left undefined. Certainly, perusing the AD&D Dungeon Master’s Guide and the Basic Rules, I had little idea about how and when to use traps. And, more importantly, what role they played in the game. One of the oddest things was how bad thieves were at dealing with them. A first-level … Continue reading A Few Thoughts on Traps
Here is a short encounter from the Dungeons & Dragons game I ran tonight. (For 3rd-5th level characters) A short greenish statue, about four-feet tall, of a humanoid figure with a fish-like head, squats on the far side of the room opposite the door. Two green gems glitter in its eye sockets. The statue is made of green-glazed clay and is hollow. It represents a … Continue reading Idol of the Fish People
Exploring Eberron is the new 240+ page sourcebook from Keith Baker (and company) that expands on Eberron lore, now available on the DMs Guild as a PDF or Print-on-Demand hardcover. This article is one of a series looking at the contents of the book. It is too soon to call it a proper review; instead, it is my first impressions of the product. So far, … Continue reading A Look at Exploring Eberron, part 3: Faiths
Exploring Eberron, the new book by Keith Baker (and others) is now out. I am looking at a review copy of the book and writing a not-a-review of the book. Why not a review? Well, because I have not had a chance to use it in play. I might feel sort-of-confident to assess adventures before I run them, but I am a little more cautious … Continue reading A look at Exploring Eberron, part 2: Races
