u/Organic-Exit2190

Are they basically the same thing? Which one should i use? Should i use both at the same time? (I'm a Conjurer with Arcane Disciple: Summoning domain)

> Deceptive Summons (Su): At 1st level, you can attempt to trick evil creatures you conjure into serving you for longer than they normally would. When casting a summon monster spell to summon an evil-aligned creature, you can attempt a Bluff check as a free action, opposed by the creature�s Sense Motive check. If your check succeeds, the duration of the effect is doubled (as if by the Extend Spell feat), and the summoned creature might be subject to additional effects as described below. If it fails, the duration remains as normal and no additional effects can be applied. If you fail the check by 5 or more, the creature breaks free of your control and is hostile toward you (though it still disappears as normal when the spell�s duration ends).

But what if that evil creature doesn't have the sense motive skill? Do i automatically success or fail?

I'm having... oneshot idea, that will require a list of cliche/trope monster/trap/situation/boss that you usually find in a dungeon for lv5 players (mimic chest, spike trap, boulder trap, etc) Don't wanna spoil it too much, but the theme will be a "false dungeon". Any suggestion?

A storm is about to hit our country this weekend. If it rain too heavily, this week's session might be cancelled. So i'm planning a B plan of hosting oneshot on Discord (and to let our DM have a weekend off to be a player, lol). But the thing is, i've never setup roll20 or host a game on Discord before. Does anyone have tips and guide video to run it? Much appreciated

I'm having the idea of making a campaign around this setting which i called "The Great Illithid War" (or any other alien species if you hate DnD 5e). It took place in your regular fantasy setting (elf, dwarf, goblin, dragon,... you know the drill) until one fateful day, a meteor crashed onto the realm, inside it... was an alien creature, tasked to turn this whole world into a Hivemind. Fastly and surely, it infected the area with some kind of fungus, turning every creature exposed with it into mindless, loyal minion for the Hivemind. Its influence are expanding day by day, other countries have noticed it. Some prepare their army for war. Some, foolishly enough, are researching for a way to turn the Hivemind into their own weapon. But for the commonfolk, they only know one thing: War is inevitable. Kingdoms from all over the world are starting to recruit troops to face this threat. The campaign will take place several years after the meteor crashed. I'm planning for the player to be new recruit, that were sent straight into the frontline. Yeah, that's the premise of it. What system would be the best to run this kind of campaign?

So i wanted to my players to start as ordinary adventurers (hunting monsters, protecting carriage,... for money). But then, a sudden event would change their entire life (for example, a super powerful mindflayer BBEG that's trying to turn the whole world into a hivemind, AND they attacked the city that the party are currently in first). The heroes will have to find a way to get stronger, to find out how they would defeat this powerful BBEG. But... i've come into a problem. I have no idea how to "smoothly" gave them a reason to take on this task. Since it's not actually their problem, shouldn't they left that "quest" for a more experienced/high level party to handle? Idk, i'm kinda having a "DM block" with this problem, so any advice would be much appreciated

My local game group mostly play 3.5e and 5e DnD. We're currently in a multi-year long campaign, and i'll be honest, the sessions has become a bit... dried(?) lately. I think playing the same system for a year, weekly, can cause that. So i'm thinking of stiring things up a little by GMing a different TTRPG system oneshot once a month. Problem is, DnD is still our main system, and making other player learn a whole 300 pages long rulebook doesn't seem to be a very good idea. So i'll need some TTRPG with: short rule (50-150 pages rulebook, less would be even better), easy/fast character creation. A specific theme aren't that importance since they're pretty much in for anything (sci-fi, low/high fantasy, apocalypse, cyberpunk, etc)

By martial, i meant frontline classes like Fighter, Barbarian, TWF Rogue, Psi Warrior, etc. Their whole gimmick is to get close to the boss (our DM isn't fond of boss fight with minions, so he usually just throw high CR monster at us. He calculated the EXP beforehand so... it's alright, i guess) to deal damage to them. But the problem is, they are now vulnerable to be attack too, and the boss' damage is usually waaaayyy higher than our, and if it focus on one PC, they'll most likely be dead by turn 2 or 3, healed or not. Last time our party (2 lv15, 1 lv17 and 1 lv13 PCs) were fighting a CR 23 Ancient Dracolich, the only player who has the courage to fight it head on was our lv15 Druid, abusing his wild shape to "heal" (changing between different full health animal), and EVEN with that, he still died and has to be brought back by our lv17 Cleric's Miracle. We have another Psi Warrior player, but he's absent during that session, but i don't think he can withstand it much longer (or even close) to our Druid. So yeah, is high level combat too brutal for martial build PCs? Should the "tank" or "damage soaking" be handled by classes with feature like summons or wild shape?

I have a "feeling" that the DM is going to throw a Balor at us next session. "A demon that use a sword" at high level (considered that he let us fight a CR 23-ish Ancient Dracolich, and he *jokingly* said that it'll be an easy battle, i "think" a Balor of CR 20 isn't out of the equation). Any good strategy to fight against one of these?