u/DeaconBlueMI

In an ideal world I'd bet most DMs would love to be able to create combats with unique monsters with interesting abilities (from books like Forge of Foes) AND environments/fight locations that the players and monsters can interact with that can affect the fight. Unfortunately I don't always have that kind of time.

In your experience, if you had to choose one of those things which one helps make the combat more fun and interesting?

I'm planning to run Tales from the Yawning Portal for some friends and we're planning on using the 5.5 rules.

I was looking through the adventure on Beyond and noticed all the links to monster's, spells, items etc all link back to the legacy version of those. It will make using DDB for the adventure a bit complicated.

I'm sure its a pretty big undertaking to change all the links from the old books to the updated links/versions, but 5.5 has been out for well over a year now.

Does anyone know if that's something on the roadmap or is it not something I should be holding my breath for?

I’m finding my biggest problem creating home brew encounters, quests and adventures is just getting the ball rolling. If I can get a couple words, ideas or monsters for inspiration I can go from there, but sometimes I find myself getting paralyzed at the start with a blank sheet/screen in front of me.

Does anyone have suggestions of resources that might have lists or rollable tables that can help give inspiration for quests and adventures? I’m not looking for random encounter tables really. But some prompts for things that I can turn into a few sessions worth of content.

For you DMs that DM away from home, I'm curious about what you pack to take with you to your games? Some times I feel like I may haul too much.

My pack usually consists of a crate holding a collapsible folder of 2D terrain, a little box of 1 inch wood cubes to make actual elevation/walls if needed, condition rings and aoe markers, a pack of 2d/printable minis for planned encounters if I have time to print/cut organize, a tackle box that holds all my doodly-dos (meeples, markers, dry erase pens, 1 inch/2 inch dry erase circles to use as emergency/random encounter minis, flying stands, dice, spare parts) and my roll of dry erase maps. I also have a couple binders of Pathfinder Pawns I usually don't haul around unless I think I might need them.

My backpack has my Chromebook, DM binder, session folder/clipboard and whatever other random stuff I need.

What's in your kit? I'm always looking for ideas that could make things easier for me and more fun for the players, but still easy to haul around.

I know there’s lots of videos with suggestions on better ways to prep and how not to over prep.

I was wondering what has worked for regular joe DMs to break the over prep habit? Did you force yourself to go into sessions cold turkey with little or nothing prepped?

My weakness is dungeon crawls. I feel like I need to have the whole place prepped because I have no idea how fast the group will make it through.

I know this is going to be fully based on the personal opinion of those responding.

I was curious what folks believe is the class that is most affected by the subclass choices available?

Which class has subclasses that make the most difference in how the class is played depending on the subclass chosen, making it feel like it has the most variety in play-styles and “feel” and “vibes”?

We'll be starting a new campaign soon and its the first time I'm trying to run something in a completely homebrew world.

My intention is to have the group all starting together with some ties to each other and the small town they are starting in.

For DMs that regularly run in homebrew worlds, I'm curious how much of it you showed your players at the start? I like the idea of spiraling out into larger and larger areas as the players level, but I also want the world to feel alive and something worth exploring.

Did your players have a map of your whole world or just their local area? Did the know about major cities and points of interest that were more than a few days travel from their home village? Did you let them discover events and plots in different areas or did you tell them where they could find different things from the get go? I'd be happy to hear any tips you might have that helped your players explore your world.

You get asked to fill in as a DM (or you volunteer) at your FLGS on short notice.

What T1 and T2 adventures are your go to's that are fun and also easy to prep?

We have lawn seats for N1 in GR and we’re taking our soon to be 9 year old to his first show (it’s actually his birthday that day).

Any tips for a smoother time for him (and his parents)?

Ear protection is handled. I’m bummed the new arena in GR doesn’t have chair rental but we’re planning to bring them with.

I tend to lean towards classes/builds that can do a decent job at damage and support or control. I'll be playing a sorcerer in a 5.5 campaign and I'm trying to decide which way to possibly go between Divine Soul and Spellfire. We'll probably be going to around level 12 or 13.

I know Divine Soul didn't get the expanded spell list that redesigned subclasses did (were playing Adventurer's League rules so no homebrewing an expanded spell list or anything), but they did get more prepared spells than they did in 2014 and having access to the whole cleric spell list allows a lot of choices. The Spellfire sorcerer does get to lean into all of the benefits and design changes that came with 5.5 (like handing out temp HP)

Has anyone played either of them so far or have any thoughts on which one feels more well rounded or (in their opinion) fun to play?

I’m from Michigan, I don’t travel out of state for shows very often and I always looked forward to the Summer show at Pine Knob. I’ve still made it to 30+ shows, almost all in Michigan.

It was an hour away from my house. Parking lot was chill for tailgating and the venue itself is great and has won awards for an outdoor venue. Parking was even included in the ticket price. We were kind of spoiled at that venue.

This year things have moved to Grand Rapids. I understand why it may have moved (closer to Chicago and trying to promote a new venue so they may have gotten a favorable deal) and I appreciate the opportunity to have 2 shows.

But now I’m 2 1/2 hours away. We’re able to stay the night with some family which is nice. But apparently the amphitheater in GR has no parking lot. It’s all city parking in lots where you can find it. Looking online you can pre-book spots but the closest I’m finding already are a mile from the show. Spots are being resold on sites for $60-$100. I know there’s spots to go downtown to eat and drink but I’m sure they’re going to be packed. And with no idea where to park or what the rules are tailgating will be tough or impossible.

I’m excited about the shows. But I’m feeling a bit bummed that the whole vibe of the day will be so different from what I’ve been used to.

I need a little help with a ticking clock dungeon using 10 minute dungeon turn rules I'm trying to design.

In a nutshell, the party has to fight a big bad and stop a ritual. They have X amount of time to do it (my initial thought was 2 hours). There are 5 nodes in the dungeon they can disable which will make the final boss easier. I don't intend for there to be enough time to disable ALL the nodes, maybe 2 or 3 of the 5.

Having never made one before, the part where I'm stuck is trying to figure out how long to make the clock/timer versus the size of the dungeon. I'll be using the 10 minute dungeon timer idea so every time the group decides to spend time searching, unlocking locks, disabling traps a tick of the timer goes off.

Does anyone have any suggestions on how to figure out how long a clock should be versus the size of the dungeon or the objectives? Any ideas for easy and subtle ways to turn the dials to either speed up or slow down the group if they are moving faster or slower than you intend?

So this is probably a loooong shot but I’ve found lists of odder dnd related things.

Has anyone come across a list of dungeons from 5e published adventures, and even more helpful, about what levels they are tuned for?

I have access to a lot of the books and I’d like to steal bits and pieces for my game, and maybe someone’s done this work already?

I’m not the woodworking type so probably not looking to build my own table.

I bought an inexpensive (couple hundred bucks) table kit about 6 years ago that fits my Akorn but it’s starting to show wear and tear.

I’ve been searching for options to replace it but all the ones I’m seeing fit the BGE and KJ because they sit flat and don’t need to hang.

Any chance knows of a good stand/table to buy that would fit the Akorn? I just like having a little extra room for food/accessories.

I know different DMs and groups run different types of games. And I know there's probably some nuance to this answer (like maybe a DM doesn't do it with first time players, or maybe they wait until after the characters reach a certain level).

But in general, do you have your monsters/enemies go after characters who are down at 0 hp? Does it matter to you if its a circumstance where a monster with multi-attack downs the character on the first attack with attacks left, or will you have monsters go out of their way to attack a downed PC if they aren't being threatened?

I know the intelligence/tactics of the monsters will factor in. I'm just curious about the number of DMs that go after a downed character compared to the ones who may keep their combats a little less deadly.

When designing encounters and tweaking monsters I’ve definitely frustrated myself by giving a monster/enemy too many different abilities or using too many different stat blocks making things hard to keep track of.

I’m curious, what are your encounter sweet spots? Whats the right number of interesting abilities to give a monster to make it interesting but not overwhelming for you? What do you think is a good number of different monster/stat blocks to use in an encounter to make it an interesting fight but not a pain to run?

Outside of the fact that an AL character has to be RAW/no home brew, what are some builds that seem popular but might not be as fun/interesting in an AL one shot focused setting?

I’m running a group through a 5th Ed version of Red Hand of Doom and we’ve gotten to a point near the end of the adventure where a red dragon is attacking part of a city.

I’ve spiced up the dragon a bit with some legendary actions since it’s mostly a solo monster encounter.

Most of the tips I’ve seen about running dragons all seem to revolve around “don’t let them land”. Tactically that seems right, but that seems like it would be a really frustrating slog of a fight for a group that’s not heavily ranged focused.

Do you ever just decide to let the dragon land and get up in the players faces to kick the fight into gear or do you always play your dragons as breath weapon machines who strafe just out of range of the players?

Editing/adding - in this particular adventure it makes clear that this dragon will fight to the death and the PCs are supposed to fight/kill it. In RHoD the dragons are minions of a bigger bad. Having the PCs run and let the dragon destroy the town would essentially end the story.