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History Comes Inside! posted:Just play Death House and tune it to suit I took a quick look at the pdf and as written it is definitely more than I've got time to prep for, but stealing the house layout and the basic plot points doesn't seem like a bad idea. Late edit so I'm not spamming the thread: However this turns out I have at least come up with the name Volvulus Scromit for the NPC that gets the players to the Not Death House mansion in Ville Possum and I'm pretty chuffed about that. It's gonna be fun once the players figure out he's a blood golem and magic prevents them from leaving the estate. Government Handjob fucked around with this message at 23:01 on Apr 13, 2023 |
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Apr 13, 2023 20:12
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I'm working on a homebrew version of 5th ed that fixes its issues. For example, to avoid endgame combat where everyone hits everyone on every roll, I was going to give each class some flavorful way to add their proficiency bonus to AC. So I was wondering, what are all the different design problems with 5e in your opinion, and are there any similar systems that fix or avoid them which I could use for inspiration?
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Apr 14, 2023 04:59
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do not run death house lmao
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Apr 14, 2023 06:24
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Death House is totally fine if you start it at level 2, give a rest in the kids' room, remove the Grick in the basement, and give them a small animal or NPC to sacrifice on the altar. If you don't have time to run the whole thing, just start them in the basement and activate the house itself.
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Apr 14, 2023 06:58
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Zurreco posted:Death House is totally fine if you start it at level 2, give a rest in the kids' room, remove the Grick in the basement, and give them a small animal or NPC to sacrifice on the altar. If you don't have time to run the whole thing, just start them in the basement and activate the house itself. I ran a bunch of players through death house, and there is a ton of community effort in smoothing out the experience and making it creepier. There's a reddit for it (and the rest of the strahd campaign). One of the community suggestions was in the library to have a book with a character's name on the spine, with a jump scare if they opened the book. One of my players who was searching in the library saw the book, read the spine, and then just left the library. Didn't even want to read it. Also the various animated bits of furniture, armor and the mimic room made for a player's Paladin (who has gone on to be in other DM's campaigns) to have a very fragile relationship with house furnishings.
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Apr 14, 2023 07:18
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I am currently running Strahd and folded in a lot of community stuff when the party did Death House. They still have Lancelot with them, which is a touch annoying, but I made Gertruda his original owner to make things spicy later. I think Death House is good as is. My only gripe is thaylt your party can legit skip whole chunks of the basement if they find the stairs too early, which is what my party did. They never got to meet the Dursts.
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Apr 14, 2023 16:51
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Zurreco posted:I am currently running Strahd and folded in a lot of community stuff when the party did Death House. They still have Lancelot with them, which is a touch annoying, but I made Gertruda his original owner to make things spicy later. My party skipped Death House entirely. We just noped out and went on to the first town lol
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Apr 14, 2023 18:12
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Anyone have tips for leading the party to/from interesting areas in a dungeon? Anytime I try to do narrative beats, sounds or clues, that something cool might be around the corner they get scared and run away. Whenever I try to make it obvious there is a dangerous or deadly encounter/trap, they often go "ooo, must be something good over there" or "lol, I'll just try to pull a quick prank on the Slaad". I have tried reversing my tactics, thinking my "always sounds sarcastic" voice was the issue; doesn't work. I tried dropping spoilerish notes/partial maps from previous failed adventurers. I've tried having NPCs give local lore or tips. Or is this just DMing as normal?
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Apr 14, 2023 18:21
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That just sounds like an inexperienced party that doesn't understand that they have to play ball to experience content. My best advice is to find out what each specific character is looking for in the grand scheme and then drop hints to get their attention. If you can't appeal to their curiosity as adventurers, appeal to their interest/greed as individual characters. You can also introduce things like patrolling mobs, looming threats, or planned closures of escape routes that force the party to go deeper into a dungeon and/or make decisions on the fly. If those don't work, sometimes you have to be a bit heavy handed and use passive perception or passive insight (or whatever skill you need) to introduce a stimulus that the whole party can hear. Things like "you are a talented spellcaster and can feel the subtle density of the weave in the next room," or "based on your background and WIS, you know that the hum of the metal being worked on in this smithy is a step above standard iron and steel." If your PCs just want to gently caress around, I don't see a means of adjusting your DMing that will work better than them adjusting their playstyle. You might just have to take a step back and put less effort into building dungeons and encounters. Some folks just want to play dumb characters and roll dice all session long.
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Apr 14, 2023 19:00
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I like to appeal to the party's sense of self preservation. Don't wanna go to the dungeon? The orcs grow overconfident and attack the town. Don't want to raid the abandoned wizard tower? Elementals, drawn by the party's magical aura, hound them such that they can't sleep over the night. Generally, I plan beforehand (that is, during session prep, not during the game) to have bad guys do bad things. This is something concrete, not a vague masterplan. I have a list with me during the session of things that the bad guys will do if the "heroes" do nothing. It might look something like this: 1. Goblins extort the townsfolk for money. 2. Goblins fly kites to drop bombs on the town. 3. Fisherman are attacked in the Catfish Swamp. Whenever there's a lull in the action, I drop one of those things on the players and make sure they know only they can stop it. You can see how this will force the players to the dungeon unless there's something really weird going on with Player-DM expectations (e.g., your players didn't realize that their characters need to be adventurous to be adventurers). Again, it's helpful to make these evil things concrete and non-sequentrial so you can throw them in anywhere during the session. If you're interested in more, I recommend looking into Dungeon World's "Adventure Fronts" system. Also, everything Zurreco said is great. Those are all good methods to try and different ways to think about your problem. edit: rereading the post, I think you would like the players to take problems more seriously? In that case, I mean, you can usually just kill a player character and that's that. Just foreshadow repeatedly that the encounter might be deadly, and if they decide to pants the Death Slaad despite the warnings then maybe that character gets what they get. No need to steer them away from it haha HOMOEROTIC JESUS fucked around with this message at 21:39 on Apr 14, 2023 |
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Apr 14, 2023 20:42
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NotNut posted:I'm working on a homebrew version of 5th ed that fixes its issues. For example, to avoid endgame combat where everyone hits everyone on every roll, I was going to give each class some flavorful way to add their proficiency bonus to AC. So I was wondering, what are all the different design problems with 5e in your opinion, and are there any similar systems that fix or avoid them which I could use for inspiration? Here's something I found that seems to be what I'm looking for. Is anybody familiar with it, or has any thoughts on the changes it makes? https://drive.google.com/file/d/11o3jWW8w9EgEHjmSB7afkGHwegbUe8_Z/view
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Apr 14, 2023 21:52
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HOMOEROTIC JESUS posted:I like to appeal to the party's sense of self preservation. You know how I know your party is different from ny party?
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Apr 14, 2023 21:54
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Toshimo posted:You know how I know your party is different from ny party? 
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Apr 14, 2023 22:03
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Just finished statting the BBEG for the barbarian region of my world. What would you say his CR is? Commissioned Art For Reference 
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Apr 15, 2023 08:13
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According to the MM on a business card math, somewhere in the CR 10-12 range. A lot tankier than most 10s but less dpr probably than than the 12+s I'm looking at for comparison.
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Apr 15, 2023 09:16
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homeless snail posted:According to the MM on a business card math, somewhere in the CR 10-12 range. A lot tankier than most 10s but less dpr probably than than the 12+s I'm looking at for comparison. Haha perfect mid-level antagonist then.
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Apr 15, 2023 10:32
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 I added an extra multi-attack to try and balance him out a bit more.
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Apr 15, 2023 11:07
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He is really cool, but his main attacks are really vanilla.
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Apr 15, 2023 13:30
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I'd personally go with Legendary Resistances compared to Indomitable. When the BB you've built up ends up being a lame duck because the GM has particularly bad saving throws that day, it's very anti-climatic (funny, but anti-climatic).
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Apr 15, 2023 13:37
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If he’s a mid-campaign adversary, I’d say give him a magic weapon the PCs can loot afterward and have it either impose some effect (Str save or fall prone, for example) or be intelligent with useful powers (Like Mirror Image or Misty Step). The PCs get it after winning the fight. If your campaign is magic-lite, you could have it fueled by the user expending HD. Your villain isn’t likely to get a short rest and has lots of HD to spend, but the PCs will be more limited in using the weapon’s abilities. Or give him an interesting non-weapon item. Something like a Robe of Scintellating Colors will completely chamge the combat dynamic.
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Apr 15, 2023 15:23
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Give him a legendary action to force a STR save or be shoved/grappled/knocked prone. Also, at that level their attacks should be magical.
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Apr 15, 2023 17:27
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He has a horned skull as a mask, you've got to let him charge at people and gore them.
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Apr 15, 2023 18:09
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Is there anywhere I could go to read a comprehensive criticism of 5th edition's rules, or a list of the most common criticisms? Edit: I should be clear, I'm not talking about this in an edition wars sense, why it's worse or better than any other edition. I mean criticisms of 5e on its own merits as a game, which I could use as guidance when designing homebrew. NotNut fucked around with this message at 18:12 on Apr 15, 2023 |
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Apr 15, 2023 18:10
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NotNut posted:Is there anywhere I could go to read a comprehensive criticism of 5th edition's rules, or a list of the most common criticisms? System Mastery has 4 episodes or so dedicated to this that might help you get started here. I’d be interested in any other resources too.
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Apr 15, 2023 18:13
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So what does a good Curse of Strahd even look like? The book is a nightmare of deadly nonsense, and my only experience in a very heavily homebrewed version was a DM with great ideas and wonderful characterization but bad encounter design and never-ending dick-kicking story beats.
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Apr 15, 2023 20:09
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Gray Ghost posted:System Mastery has 4 episodes or so dedicated to this that might help you get started here. I’d be interested in any other resources too. I listened to their 5th edition episode and it was pretty good, thanks.
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Apr 15, 2023 21:36
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Nehru the Damaja posted:So what does a good Curse of Strahd even look like? The book is a nightmare of deadly nonsense, and my only experience in a very heavily homebrewed version was a DM with great ideas and wonderful characterization but bad encounter design and never-ending dick-kicking story beats. Honestly? Take 50% of the content from a given locale and cut it. Like any good horror scenario, you need to give the PCs a reason to gently caress around with anything, especially if you are up front about the "poo poo is hosed and you will die a horrible death" vibe. If you try to leave enough clues/hints for everything in the book, the players will get analysis paralysis or just flee once they have a "safer" place to be. Once the content has been pared down, rework most of it to specifically fit the PCs so that they actually want to stick their neck out. You don't need to be a good aligned PC to oppose an evil force, so there are ways to work plot for every PC. This gives for chances of reprieve from the dick kicking beats and early shows of force. Beyond that, you really need the horror to show in multiple different forms. Gothic horror or body horror only works for so long until the players just say "yeah, another zombie trying to kill us? big deal." Strahd has a lot of inbuilt opportunities for body horror, eldritch horror, psychological horror, etc and the DM should really work to build that up. Van Richten's has a good guide on how to fold different beats and themes into a roller coaster of bad times. Not everything needs to be a direct threat to the lives of the PCs but some things need to be a threat to other things that matter to them. A thriving town can fall into chaos, kids can be sacrificed, gods can turn their backs on their followers, all if the players do nothing. That normally applies to any campaign but Strahd has a lot of that built in.
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Apr 16, 2023 01:31
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I took some of the advice you guys gave me in this thread and I think hes looking like a better boss so far.
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Apr 16, 2023 08:42
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trapstar posted:I took some of the advice you guys gave me in this thread and I think hes looking like a better boss so far. What does he do with the widows after he takes them?
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Apr 16, 2023 09:10
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BabyFur Denny posted:What does he do with the widows after he takes them? Here is his backstory that explains it. "Kor was the son of Gor, chieftain of the Agarians, a barbarian tribe in the region of the world known as the “Barbarian Lands”. Growing up, Kor was willing to do anything to prove his strength. By the time he was fourteen, he was already a fearsome warrior, favoring the greataxe. As a young man, Kor became the chief war leader and enforcer for his father. He led many raids on other tribes especially against their mortal enemies the Terveri. Soon after Kor grew into manhood, Gor arranged a bride for his son. He was to marry Thesna, daughter of Eretil, chieftain of the Franes, for the price of seven cows. Shortly after making this arrangement Gor passed away peacefully in his sleep and was honored with a great feast. Kor was still mourning his father’s death when he learned that Eretil had broken his promise to marry his daughter Thesna to Kor. He was instead planning to marry her to Agaric, chieftain of the Terveri. Kor gathered his warriors and led a raid into the great hall of the Franes, killing many as they slept. Eretil awoke in time to meet Kor in battle, but the old chieftain was brutally defeated by the powerful Kor. Kor brought Thesna and Ilva, the widow of Eretil, out naked before his warriors. Kor boldly declared that he was “Kor, Taker of Widows''. He and his warriors plundered all the gold and treasures of the Franes, including their livestock and returned to their homes rich in the spoils of their conquest. When the Terveri heard news of this conquest, Agaric came to confront Kor. He entered Kor’s great hall demanding that he release Thesna and give her to him as Eretil had promised. He demanded that Kor release Ilva as well. In response, Kor had his warriors butcher Agaric's men. Kor’s warriors disarmed him and restrained Agaric. Kor then told Agaric that he was going to “cut off his head and drink from his skull” as he decapitated him with one fell swing of his greataxe. Kor rallied his warriors and plundered the Terveri of their women, treasures and livestock. The few Terveri warriors that remained to resist them were disheartened by the loss of their chieftain and surrendered. Kor had each man executed and razed the Terveri village to the ground. Kor, now confident in his supremacy, adopted an ox skull mask as a symbol of his strength. He pillaged neighboring tribes forcing them to pay tribute to treasure, livestock and daughters. Kor, Taker of Widows, is now one of the most feared chieftains in the Barbarian Lands known far and wide for his strength and brutality." I really wanted to make the sort of "rear end in a top hat Barbarian with no comprehension of morality" type character.
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Apr 16, 2023 09:15
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trapstar posted:I took some of the advice you guys gave me in this thread and I think hes looking like a better boss so far. Do you guys think I should up the slashing damage on the charge by another 1d12? Edit: I think I'm gonna do it. 
trapstar fucked around with this message at 11:57 on Apr 16, 2023 |
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Apr 16, 2023 11:15
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Are men and women not physically equivalent in this world? Dude is going to try to take a barbarian warrior widow who goes into a rage and knocks his block off.
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Apr 16, 2023 15:20
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What's some decent magical items for a spore druid? The obvious ones don't seem to synergize well.
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Apr 16, 2023 15:21
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The answer for druids is always Staff of the Woodlands. Casting Awaken every day for 1 action instead of 8 hours and no 1000gp material component is stupidly broken. Awakened beasts/plants are charmed for 30 days, so in addition to making 4-5 zombies through Fungal Infestation for an hour you can also surround yourself with 30+ permanent intelligent walking mushrooms.
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Apr 16, 2023 15:43
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I missed that and that sounds awesome.
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Apr 16, 2023 15:54
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Nemo posted:The answer for druids is always Staff of the Woodlands. Casting Awaken every day for 1 action instead of 8 hours and no 1000gp material component is stupidly broken. Well, permanent so long as you stay on their good side. After 30 days they're free agents
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Apr 16, 2023 16:50
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Facebook Aunt posted:Are men and women not physically equivalent in this world? Dude is going to try to take a barbarian warrior widow who goes into a rage and knocks his block off. He draws more of his inspiration from literary concepts and old historical figures like Genghis Khan.
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Apr 17, 2023 02:42
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Is there a way to word this magic item better? It's not supposed to be strong, it's basically just a +1 greataxe, but every so often he's going to crit with it and get a fun bonus. But I'd like to make the wording clearer if I can.quote:You have a +1 bonus to attack and damage rolls made with this magic weapon.
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Apr 17, 2023 13:37
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disaster pastor posted:Is there a way to word this magic item better? It's not supposed to be strong, it's basically just a +1 greataxe, but every so often he's going to crit with it and get a fun bonus. But I'd like to make the wording clearer if I can. What if the active Wild Surge doesn't have a damage component? The player is going to be a little annoyed that their crit does nothing. The first condition is "while raging," so I'd put that first. quote:While raging, when you score a critical hit with this melee weapon, if your active Wild Surge effect has a damage component, you may have the target take an extra 1d12 damage of the same type of damage your active Wild Surge inflicts. [[If your active Wild Surge effect does not have a damage component, you may have the target take an extra 1d12 slashing damage.]] Actually, I can simplify that further: quote:While raging, when you score a critical hit with this melee weapon, if your active Wild Surge effect has a damage component, you may have the target take an extra 1d12 damage of the same type of damage your active Wild Surge inflicts, [[or 1d12 slashing otherwise.]]
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Apr 17, 2023 14:00
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Stabbey_the_Clown posted:What if the active Wild Surge doesn't have a damage component? The player is going to be a little annoyed that their crit does nothing. Moving "while raging" helps, thanks! I don't think he'll be too upset if he crits and doesn't get the fun bonus, but you're right that I should be erring on the side of "more fun." How about this? quote:While raging, when you score a critical hit with this melee weapon, you may have the target take an additional 1d6 slashing damage. If your active Wild Surge effect has a damage component, you may also have the target take an additional 1d6 damage of the same type of damage your active Wild Surge inflicts. Does something with rage-crits no matter the Wild Surge, but does something cool and flavorful if there's a damaging Wild Surge active. Though it does reduce the barbarian-ness by switching to 1/2d6 from 1d12. Maybe you're right and the extra three average damage doesn't matter, it should just be 1d12 either way, slashing without a Wild Surge bonus and [damage type] with a Wild Surge bonus.
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Apr 17, 2023 14:10
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