The Dungeons and Dragons Megathread v2

[MusclesMarinara]

Hey guys. Here's one of my latest maps. Super easy to draw and had my players fascinated.

What I have chosen to do is use the Earth as my map. It give me a great many ideas for geographic features and places for towns. I just mix up historical settings to make it work.

EDIT: As it is likely not obvious, this map is based on southern/ central Vermont. Route 7 has been renamed the Green Mountain highway and the Connecticut River is now, the Puritan River. For any would be Dungeon Master, I would recommend trying this drill: Pull up a map of an area you have some familiarity with. Cut out the modern details such as Interstates and pull from existing locations for ideas. As an example, one of the towns I was working on had a street called Ratcliffe. Can you think of a better name for the street that runs along the rat infested docks?

 

[Grassshoppa]

View attachment 1032337
Hey guys. Here's one of my latest maps. Super easy to draw and had my players fascinated.

What I have chosen to do is use the Earth as my map. It give me a great many ideas for geographic features and places for towns. I just mix up historical settings to make it work.

Looks awesome. Is that a wall that runs north-south on the west side of the map? What's it keeping out... or in?

 

[MusclesMarinara]

Looks awesome. Is that a wall that runs north-south on the west side of the map? What's it keeping out... or in?

Thanks for pointing that out. I forgot to label an important feature.
That's the Iron Goat. The dwarves have mastered the steam engine. Here it takes the form of a steam locomotive. It made of oiled cast iron and brass. They've mounted a nozzle to the top of the boiler to deter any would be boarders.

I have in my mind that elves have hot air balloons and hang gliders. But I haven't been able to work that in.

 

[Thrawn33]

Thanks for pointing that out. I forgot to label an important feature.
That's the Iron Goat. The dwarves have mastered the steam engine. Here it takes the form of a steam locomotive. It made of oiled cast iron and brass. They've mounted a nozzle to the top of the boiler to deter any would be boarders.

I have in my mind that elves have hot air balloons and hang gliders. But I haven't been able to work that in.

Nice.

The gnomes were my steam punk tech-era race in my old campaign. They just weren't agressive/militaristic/capitalist to use it to a global advantage.

 

[Grassshoppa]

What's the best AI D&D art creator? I just started playing around with Copilot today and it's pretty cool.

 

[MusclesMarinara]

Hey guys, we have a session coming up this Tuesday and my ogre needs some help.

We left of with the party face to face with Oona the ogre who was leaning through the partially open solid wood gate between the watch towers. In one hand she had a partially boiled golbin who twitched feebly in her grasping. Angry that someone would interupt her meal, she bit a chunck off the goblin , threw the remainder to her two pet vultures and shouted.

The party consists of five 3rd level characters. One of which is a bard. I know he will cast Tasha's hideous laughter and my idiot ogre will fail her wisdom saving throw.

As a note, I run my ogres like barbarians. They get 'rage' and 'reckless' attacks. Right in the ogre description it says ogres will fly into a rage. So why not apply it mechanically?

The other note is the back story. The ogre and her former partners, the goblins, took the tower gate from a small contingent of gaurds, whom they readily dispatched. However in the process of dividing the loot, the ogre threw the gaurds into her kettle along with their coin purses. This lead her to believe that the goblins were cheating her from her share. Well, ogres are gunna ogre. She mashed several and captured a few, but the remainder scattered into the woods. We have ten goblins on standby waiting for revenge.

My initial thought was to have the ogre grab the halfling rougue pull her through the gate and close the door behind her. However, I'm not sure if ogres are smart enough to devise such at tactic. It was only going to get meaner as on the following round the ogre was going to stuff the halfling into the kettle.

Any thoughts?

 

[Thrawn33]

Hey guys, we have a session coming up this Tuesday and my ogre needs some help.

We left of with the party face to face with Oona the ogre who was leaning through the partially open solid wood gate between the watch towers. In one hand she had a partially boiled golbin who twitched feebly in her grasping. Angry that someone would interupt her meal, she bit a chunck off the goblin , threw the remainder to her two pet vultures and shouted.

The party consists of five 3rd level characters. One of which is a bard. I know he will cast Tasha's hideous laughter and my idiot ogre will fail her wisdom saving throw.

As a note, I run my ogres like barbarians. They get 'rage' and 'reckless' attacks. Right in the ogre description it says ogres will fly into a rage. So why not apply it mechanically?

The other note is the back story. The ogre and her former partners, the goblins, took the tower gate from a small contingent of gaurds, whom they readily dispatched. However in the process of dividing the loot, the ogre threw the gaurds into her kettle along with their coin purses. This lead her to believe that the goblins were cheating her from her share. Well, ogres are gunna ogre. She mashed several and captured a few, but the remainder scattered into the woods. We have ten goblins on standby waiting for revenge.

My initial thought was to have the ogre grab the halfling rougue pull her through the gate and close the door behind her. However, I'm not sure if ogres are smart enough to devise such at tactic. It was only going to get meaner as on the following round the ogre was going to stuff the halfling into the kettle.

Any thoughts?

You want to stop the Tasha's Laughter from ending the encounter quick is what I'm getting?

Not knowing the mechanics of whatever edition...here's some shit thrown at a wall

Raging used to give a bonus to Wil saving throws. Ogre rages harder and gets good bonus.

Have the gate (or portaclus nobody knew was there) just randomly close at a time best for you

Goblin "allies" fuck something up and hit bard on accident as distraction or ruining spell

Ogre grabs halfling then gets distracted by something inside, closing gate behind it as it turns to deal with...you get what you want without breaking character.

 

[MusclesMarinara]

@Thrawn33
Thanks for the input. I play 5e a little dumbed down for speed of play.

The encounter takes place at 'Gate' in the map I provided in an earlier post. It is a the reach of civilization, so it wouldn't have a portcullis ( at least not by the illustration I had given. A different drawing in this thread).

Working off your thoughts, if the ogre fails the save, maybe the goblins take the opportunity to riddle her with arrows? Save with advantage to break the spell effects. I would also feel comfortable applying advantage on the initial save considering Oona will be raging.

Cool. I have some ideas I can work with. Probably for naught as the players will likely take some left turn I haven't prepared for.


As a side note, I often give my monsters skills or feats associated with PCs. I figure I should have some fun too.

 

[MusclesMarinara]

So I ran the ogre encounter last night. And as usual, the party did something I hadn't accounted for. The Bromm, the dwarven bard, used his boots of spider climbing to run up the side of the tower in an attempt to man the ballista. You know, you kick yourself for the magic items you give your party.
So I went with my original plan to grab a character and pull them behind the keep's wall. Oona took hold of the warrior priest Brother Edgar and was dragging him to the soup pot. However this left her open for an attack of opportunity. (Which I fucked the ruling. I let the wizard G-Bach cast a spell). 'Hideous laughter' came and knocked my idiot of an ogre down. ( I grabbed my player with both hands and while acting in character, I said 'You funny guy' and fell over laughing. This brought a round of chuckles from the table).
Surprisingly, my giant vultures were giving them a hard time. I guess a flying creature with a breath weapon will do that. (If you want a fun creature, allow your giant vultures to projectile vomit once per day. It's what real vultures do when threatened. I treated the attack as 'Melf's acid arrow). I knocked out the rouge halfling, Bey and Bromm with the breath weapon. Albeit Bromm helped my cause as he launched himself with the ballista in an attempt to attack the flying vulture. (Yea, this makes no sense if your trying for realistic game play, but I appreciate good slapstick). With a missed attack he plummeted 20 feet to the ground taking 2d6 damage.
The save to break Hideous laughter was near impossible with the -2 penalty and when I final did, they hit me with it for another round. From there they slowly worn down Oona and her birds. Everybody had a good time, so I don't mind my AOO screw up.
You may ask why I didn't use the goblins. Well, at the round I had intended on pulling them in, the party was two members down. An additional 10 goblins with bows would have lead to a TPK. So in turn, I waiting until the party finished the fight, then I had the goblins drive them out of the towers and steal their cart and horses. In fairness it was rewarding watch the party run from a group of goblins that they would normally smoke.

 

[Thrawn33]

So I ran the ogre encounter last night. And as usual, the party did something I hadn't accounted for. The Bromm, the dwarven bard, used his boots of spider climbing to run up the side of the tower in an attempt to man the ballista. You know, you kick yourself for the magic items you give your party.
So I went with my original plan to grab a character and pull them behind the keep's wall. Oona took hold of the warrior priest Brother Edgar and was ragging him to the soup pot. However this left her open for an attack of opportunity. (Which I fucked the ruling. I let the wizard G-Bach cast a spell). 'Hideous laughter' came and knocked my idiot of an ogre down. ( I grabbed my player with both hands and while acting in character, I said 'You funny guy' and fell over laughing. This brought a round of chuckles from the table).
Surprisingly, my giant vultures were giving them a hard time. A guess a flying creature with a breath weapon will do that. (If you want a fun creature, allow you giant vultures to projectile vomit one per day. It's what real vultures do when threatened. I treated the attack as 'Melf's acid arrow). I knocked out the rouge halfling, Bey and Bromm with the breath weapon. Albeit Bromm helped my cause as he launched himself with the ballista in an attempt to attack the flying vulture. (Yea, this makes no sense if your trying for realistic game play, but I appreciate good slapstick). With a missed attack he plummeted 20 feet to the ground taking 2d6 damage.
The save to break Hideous laughter was near impossible with the -2 penalty and when I final did, they hit me with it for another round. From there they slowly worn down Oona and her birds. Everybody had a good time, so I don't mind my AOO screw up.
You may ask why I didn't use the goblins. Well, at the round I had intended on pulling them in, the party was two members down. An additional 10 goblins with bows would have lead to a TPK. So in turn, I waiting until the party finished the fight, then I had the goblins drive them out of the towers and steal their cart and horses. In fairness it was rewarding watch the party run from a group of goblins that they would normally smoke.

Well played on the goblin part, exactly what they would do, hold back and hit the survivors at their weakest.

Gotta love it when PCs short circuit what you think is an airtight Encounter.

Years into DMing I used to keep a note of any magic items and spells, especially the movement and incapacitating kind for when I planned out encounters.

 

[Grassshoppa]

So I ran the ogre encounter last night. And as usual, the party did something I hadn't accounted for. The Bromm, the dwarven bard, used his boots of spider climbing to run up the side of the tower in an attempt to man the ballista. You know, you kick yourself for the magic items you give your party.
So I went with my original plan to grab a character and pull them behind the keep's wall. Oona took hold of the warrior priest Brother Edgar and was ragging him to the soup pot. However this left her open for an attack of opportunity. (Which I fucked the ruling. I let the wizard G-Bach cast a spell). 'Hideous laughter' came and knocked my idiot of an ogre down. ( I grabbed my player with both hands and while acting in character, I said 'You funny guy' and fell over laughing. This brought a round of chuckles from the table).
Surprisingly, my giant vultures were giving them a hard time. A guess a flying creature with a breath weapon will do that. (If you want a fun creature, allow you giant vultures to projectile vomit one per day. It's what real vultures do when threatened. I treated the attack as 'Melf's acid arrow). I knocked out the rouge halfling, Bey and Bromm with the breath weapon. Albeit Bromm helped my cause as he launched himself with the ballista in an attempt to attack the flying vulture. (Yea, this makes no sense if your trying for realistic game play, but I appreciate good slapstick). With a missed attack he plummeted 20 feet to the ground taking 2d6 damage.
The save to break Hideous laughter was near impossible with the -2 penalty and when I final did, they hit me with it for another round. From there they slowly worn down Oona and her birds. Everybody had a good time, so I don't mind my AOO screw up.
You may ask why I didn't use the goblins. Well, at the round I had intended on pulling them in, the party was two members down. An additional 10 goblins with bows would have lead to a TPK. So in turn, I waiting until the party finished the fight, then I had the goblins drive them out of the towers and steal their cart and horses. In fairness it was rewarding watch the party run from a group of goblins that they would normally smoke.

I love reading session recaps. Thanks for sharing and well played sir!

 

[MusclesMarinara]

I totally appreciate this thread and more so, those who post, comment and react within.

Next up, I have an encounter planned for Rutland. Rutland is big fairground used for showcasing livestock during trade events. The area is packed with visitors during these events. But when the fair is not occurring the town is largely vacant with hulking empty barns that create narrow alleyways. Guards rarely, if ever, patrol the streets since the barns contain nothing of value.

There's another side to the livestock trade that sits below the surface. The drug smugglers use the animals to ship their goods about. You'd be surprised just how much "dragon powder" you can fit in a cow's stomach. The problem is that occasionally these packages will rupture in the beast's gut, which causes the animal to go berserk and eventual die from overdose.

"Dragon Powder" is an ugly and highly addictive drug. The first stage affects will induce a barbarian-like rage effect. With further usage, addicts will become Vampire spawn like, save the undead attributes, with a hunger for human flesh.

This encounter will have the party come face to face with a group of local toughs. One of the toughs is a "dragon powder" user. As planned, the encounter should be fairly easy for the party. Sometimes the dice have different plans though. The one wrinkle I've added is that the leader of the hooligans is a bard. My turn to use 'hideous laughter'. How you like dem apples?

 

[Thrawn33]

I totally appreciate this thread and more so, those who post, comment and react within.

Next up, I have an encounter planned for Rutland. Rutland is big fairground used for showcasing livestock during trade events. The area is packed with visitors during these events. But when the fair is not occurring the town is largely vacant with hulking empty barns that create narrow alleyways. Guards rarely, if ever, patrol the streets since the barns contain nothing of value.

There's another side to the livestock trade that sits below the surface. The drug smugglers use the animals to ship their goods about. You'd be surprised just how much "dragon powder" you can fit in a cow's stomach. The problem is that occasionally these packages will rupture in the beast's gut, which causes the animal to go berserk and eventual die from overdose.

"Dragon Powder" is an ugly and highly addictive drug. The first stage affects will induce a barbarian-like rage effect. With further usage, addicts will become Vampire spawn like, save the undead attributes, with a hunger for human flesh.

This encounter will have the party come face to face with a group of local toughs. One of the toughs is a "dragon powder" user. As planned, the encounter should be fairly easy for the party. Sometimes the dice have different plans though. The one wrinkle I've added is that the leader of the hooligans is a bard. My turn to use 'hideous laughter'. How you like dem apples?

Nice.

You could always set up the encounter with the bard as a street performer who distracts/lures the marks with his music onto a side street. Make sure he has a dancing monkey! (which could be anything...or just a plain old dancing monkey)

 

[MusclesMarinara]

Nice.

You could always set up the encounter with the bard as a street performer who distracts/lures the marks with his music onto a side street. Make sure he has a dancing monkey! (which could be anything...or just a plain old dancing monkey)

As I usually end my sessions with a cliff hanger, I had them meet up with the bard (Lincoln Continental) sitting on a picnic table eating an apple with a knife. Two of the toughs (Chevy Impala and Nissan Maximo) have been following the party through the streets since they arrived in town. Lincoln is accompanied by Toyota Thon, the Half Orc barbarian, and Clinton Marblebottom (Who is Bromm's cousin). Clinton set up the robbery looking to take advantage of his cousin's good fortune.

The encounter opened with Lincoln saying the 'cutting words', "You look like the kind of bard who covers Nicklebach". Which was funny for two reasons; 1. Nickleback insults are always funny and 2. We set up cannon that Nicklebach was a relative of the wizard, G-bach. the cherry on it, is the player who runs G-bach is from Canada.

I'll give you guys the map of Rutland when I get home.
The encounter summary will come within a month. We normally get together once a month to play.

 

[Thrawn33]

As I usually end my sessions with a cliff hanger, I had them meet up with the bard (Lincoln Continental) sitting on a picnic table eating an apple with a knife. Two of the toughs (Chevy Impala and Nissan Maximo) have been following the party through the streets since they arrived in town. Lincoln is accompanied by Toyota Thon, the Half Orc barbarian, and Clinton Marblebottom (Who is Bromm's cousin). Clinton set up the robbery looking to take advantage of his cousin's good fortune.

The encounter opened with Lincoln saying the 'cutting words', "You look like the kind of bard who covers Nicklebach". Which was funny for two reasons; 1. Nickleback insults are always funny and 2. We set up cannon that Nicklebach was a relative of the wizard, G-bach. the cherry on it, is the player who runs G-bach is from Canada.

I'll give you guys the map of Rutland when I get home.
The encounter summary will come within a month. We normally get together once a month to play.

I used comic book characters human names in one campaign for random things: Auntie Mae, Stark Anthony, Jonathan Blaze who lived in Castle Fraunk, Wainbruce...

Took a few sessions before one guy got it.

 

[MusclesMarinara]

I used comic book characters human names in one campaign for random things: Auntie Mae, Stark Anthony, Jonathan Blaze who lived in Castle Fraunk, Wainbruce...

Took a few sessions before one guy got it.

I'll steal this.
Waits for an opportunity to use Piotr Parkour

I appreciate the dancing monkey comment from your earlier post. I had a similar idea for a different character. I wanted the head of the drug ring to deliver the line "Say hello to my little friend". and then have a gnome or some other small creature come out.

 

[Thrawn33]

I'll steal this.
Waits for an opportunity to use Piotr Parkour

I appreciate the dancing monkey comment from your earlier post. I had a similar idea for a different character. I wanted the head of the drug ring to deliver the line "Say hello to my little friend". and then have a gnome or some other small creature come out.

Racking my brain trying to remember exactly what it was called, but in AD&D there was an evil smaller sized humanoid variant (think it was a gnome, could have bern a dwarf) that had an innate giant shape ability...cannot for the life of me find it...will keep digging.

Edit
Found it: duergar dwarves

 

[LilMountain]

Racking my brain trying to remember exactly what it was called, but in AD&D there was an evil smaller sized humanoid variant (think it was a gnome, could have bern a dwarf) that had an innate giant shape ability...cannot for the life of me find it...will keep digging.

Edit
Found it: duergar dwarves

5e version have that ability too, also Firbolg's can change their size as well

 

[Thrawn33]

5e version have that ability too, also Firbolg's can change their size as well

Thanks, 3.5 was the last edition we played (because I invested so much in the books) before going to Pathfinder 1e, so I'm behind on rules and stats.

 

[Bob Gray]

Just recently started a new character ina new group, half of which are friends of mine. Actually never made a rogue character in 5e, so I rolled up a soul knife. Theyre basically a skill-monkey class with telepathic communication abilities. It's pretty goddamn fun having all these tools available.

If you dont know, the soul knife has "psychic" blades that it uses in place of weapons (think Psylocke from the X-men). The blades do normal damage like a dagger, plus your proficiency, but they also leave no mark.

So I made him up as a gypsy boxer ala Brad Pitt from Snatch and he goes around challenging people to "bare knuckle" boxing matches. Talked to the DM and just made the blades invisible.

Also, Stealth is super fun when you can psychically communicate with your party up to a mile away.