When last we left our intrepid blogger, I discussed Combat and Conditions in D&D Basic, focusing particularly on how the rules had changed between the playtest packet and the final. This time, it’s Part Three, the Rules of Magic. In June of last year, I wrote about the spells of […]
This is my fourth post reviewing the D&D Basic rules, including comparison to the last playtest packet. Previous posts have covered races and classes; personality, backgrounds, and equipment; and general rules and adventuring. Judging by the title of the post, I’m probably writing about combat and conditions this time. Like […]
In this, my third post comparing D&D Basic to the last of the playtest packets, we get into the fundamental rules of D&D. In the Basic PDF, it’s Part Two: Playing the Game, but either part of that would make for a misleading post title, and what kind of barbarian […]
This post continues the detailed comparison between the D&D Basic PDF and the last playtest packet that WotC issued (10-14-2013). Part One of this analysis focused on races and classes; this time, we’re getting into more terra incognita, including one of the most-discussed paragraphs in the whole blesséd thing. Without […]
On Thursday, 3 July, 2014, the tabletop gaming world was… not rocked to its core, perhaps, but the vast majority of conversation was turned to the release of D&D Starter and D&D Basic for the new edition (which, for want of any other term, we distinguish as 5e). The former […]
Like every edition of D&D before it, D&D Next (which will really just be called D&D; it will be up to the fans to call it Fifth Edition for clarity) draws a line between arcane magic and divine magic, a separation that has informed a huge number of settings in […]
In a recent Legends & Lore post, Mearls explored some of the thought behind magic item design in the new edition of D&D, particularly with regard to attunement. I’ve seen this post take some flak in other circles, but I think it has a ton of potential and I’m really […]
Now that I’ve created or modified four classes for D&D Next (the alchemist, outlander, sorcerer, and warlock), I want to take a step back and consider what’s working, what isn’t, and a few new ideas I’ve had for future classes. It isn’t that I want each campaign to have a […]
I haven’t done much of anything new in D&D Next home-brewing for a long time, but this Thursday I’ll be reviving my Aurikesh campaign, which has been dormant since January. I remain very glad that the campaign doesn’t rely on having the same set of characters from one session to […]
In a tabletop game, “traditional” mechanical traps are awkward to include in a dungeon, and that is a real shame. I commented briefly on the problem of traps in my post on module construction, but now I want to dig into that topic more deeply and propose a new solution […]