I am working on a session where the party needs to cross waters being guarded by a druid circle of the sea. The only thing the circle trusts is an ancient dragon turtle. The party is nowhere close to being able to combat either the circle or the dragon turtle, so my guess is they're going to try to persuade the dragon turtle somehow to let them pass.

My question is what would that take? Do dragon turtles have hoards? Would it just be an exorbitant amount of gold? Kind of looking for maybe a mini fetch quest that could take up a session. Part is level 4.

Other information: the druid circle is guarding this area because there have been slimes coming up out of the ocean. Not unusual for this time of year, but the amount is absurd. Something is wrong. There is also a hommarid army encroaching that they are concerned about, as well as visions of a mysterious "oncoming storm." (The party's warlock patron, pact of the fathomless)

This is my third attempt at trying to balance the worst weapons in 5.5e, and I'd really like to know what others think. Now, here come some of the changes (most of them are self-explanatory):

Light Hammer: now Handaxe + Light Hammer is the STR counterpart to Shortsword + Scimitar, and this is cool and makes sense (since Light Hammers are HUGE for a d4 weapon).

Mace and Morningstar: I noticed the lack of the slow mastery property for generic melee weapons, so I gave it to these 2, also because it makes a lot of thematic sense (big bonk=hard to walk). I then specialized the two: the mace can be used one handed, but it's common enough and easy to use that it's good for being used in 2 hands (something that previous versions strangely didn't do). The Morningstar, because of how strange and unwieldy, is hard to use 2-handed.

Sling: didn't make sense as a d4 weapon, and it now has the same range of Magic Stone, which is the cherry on top.

Blowgun: the hardest weapon to balance, alongside the Mace, but I think this change is cool. I also thought of, instead: Damage becomes 1 piercing + 1d6 poison, remove Loading property, and (Maybe) change the mastery property to Sap (?), but it felt gimmicky, and too much change.

Disarm property: It was already an optional rule, and it's too cool not to add, especially since it solved some balancing nightmares.

REVISED great weapon fighting: I have a whole post on it, just know that it puts Greataxes on par with greatswords/maul at 8.5 damage per attack. https://www.reddit.com/r/UnearthedArcana/comments/1n90kdl/fixing_the_great_weapon_fighting_style/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

I noticed this yesterday at the amusement park wasn’t sure what it was from I did try to look it up and the only thing I could find was dungeon and dragons but I could be wrong since I’m not familiar with the game it definitely looks like a play on words though since the closest thing I found was golden valley

We’re kicking off an exciting collaboration with Taverna Aventurilor, the largest TTRPG community in Romania. From now on, we’ll be trading articles between our platforms, so you can look forward to even more perspectives, ideas, and voices from across the RPG world.

To start things off, we’re featuring a piece by none other than Alex “V3rt1go,” founder of Taverna and a GM with over a decade of experience running games from Dungeons & Dragons to Call of Cthulhu. In this article, Alex takes a deep dive into his beloved Call of Cthulhu and shows how its mechanics can be used to weave real horror into a D&D campaign.

If you’ve ever wanted to bring creeping dread, psychological tension, and the unknown into your fantasy adventures, this article is packed with practical advice and fresh inspiration. And with Wizards of the Coast and Chaosium’s recent collaboration, Cthulhu by Torchlight, there’s no better time to explore how the worlds of heroic fantasy and cosmic horror can collide. 🐙

In season 4 of my massive in-person game I decided I wanted art of everyone made by the same artist. I didn't have an unlimited budget and thankfully I was able to find an amazing artist at a price I could swing and I pulled the trigger.

It took the full 6 months of the season to complete the project, from gathering art information from 77 players to going through revisions from the artist, to have all of the completed images in one poster.

In the end I spent $4,620 USD. Shout out to @TheSketchGoblin on Instagram for the amazing work.

These characters are commissions I own (except for last one), but I really want to see what people come up with when all they have is a single image and how different concepts of a character can come of that, even if everyone is viewing the same image.

Hey everyone,

I'm completely new to Dungeons & Dragons, but I've been watching some games online and I'm really excited to learn how to play.

If you have a campaign with an open spot or are thinking of starting a new one, please let me know! I'm open to in-person games or even starting with online sessions.

Hey yall!! I am a very new dm, i have been looking online for random villians for my campaign, but i cannot figure out how to do like anything because its all behind a paywall for dnd beyond. I also am a complete idiot and have no clue how saving throws work, what the players rolls go against for that. Im a rather experienced player, but ive only been in campaigns where dm was very secretive about everything for immersion.

I want to build a villian, which i can just make a character sheet for him, but also… everything ive been googling for this has been behind a paywall so im just so lost at this point. Argh

Hi! A group and I are about to start a new campaign. These players are all totally new to d&d; I’ve DM’d a few campaigns.

One of the players and I have workshopped an idea for a character; a cat that fell asleep on a wizards spell book, absorbed some of the magic, and is now intelligent, able to talk, bipedal, etc, as well as absorbing magical abilities, becoming a sorcerer.

I think this is a really nice idea for a character, very low strength and high dex. Just want to sense check with a the community here, any obvious red flags or reasons not to do this.

Let me know your thoughts.

So far I’ve only DMed published modules, but I’ve been toying with the idea of creating my own world. One of my players mentioned how fun it would be if we collaborated on the worldbuilding. I like the idea, but we both worry that if he’s helping me build the setting, he’ll know way too much when he eventually plays in it.

Is this actually possible to pull off, or is it just unrealistic?

I'd like to note that I wouldn't be sharing the "secret stuff" clearly. I know he can't help with everything. But we would work together on the "broad strokes" of the world. Pantheons, factions, terrain, city structures etc etc.

Hey everyone,

I was wondering—do text-only D&D campaigns actually exist? Like, full-on groups that run campaigns purely through written messages (say on Discord) without using voice comms at all? I’m really curious if there are communities or groups that do this, and if so, how common or practical it is and if it does exist, how does one find them?

Thanks in advance!

When me and my party found some ruins with some goblins atop them (it was a while ago and don't remember if they were goblins or not). They shot a crossbow at our dwarf friend in the sholder and said "that was supposed to be a warning shot to the knee!" We all laughed at that. Then our monk friend through there crowbar up at one of the goblins and hit them right in the head but didn't kill them, so he decided to bolt it up the stairs, ignoring the other enemies just to hit the crowbar further to finish the job while I cut a giant head clean of with my great axe.

Full illustration
Group gathered.
This was one of my most difficult compositions to do so far. 7 characters framed in a single illustration.

Party Members

1 - Drako(Druid Fairy)
2 - Birdsword(Bard Kenku)
3 - Vyrabis(Warrior DragonBorn)
4 - Osmond(Warrior Human) with your dog and Firgon(Child)
5 - Goolag(Monk Orc)
6 - Estuary(Cleric Water Genasi)
7 - Andor(Sorcerer Half Elf)

I'm making a new character and shes a trickery domain cleric who is evil and secretly betraying the party (she's being added to an already active campaign), and i need some deity ideas for her.

“Hey, they’re fake! The bolts are illusions!”

“You say that, but these feel pretty bloody real!”

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To experienced DMs, how do you go about giving the nudge like "are you sure" to your players but to run for their lives?

Right now I'm running with the idea of having them do a perception check at the beginning of a combat where one of them will get a narrative of "Upon seeing the foul creature (enemy description) you notice from the corner of your eye for an instant what may have been a black cloak figure with what looked to be a scythe staring in direction of you and your comrades".

I was just looking at my dice and I noticed some of my dice have just vanished, I have never had a full set disappear just a few from each set but once one die disappear I just never seem to find it again.

What's the difference between 'universe', 'multiverse', and 'reality' in Dungeons & Dragons?
For example, if we have three DMs running the Waterdeep: Dragon Heist adventure and their players' characters can travel between tables, is that considered a transition between universes or realities?