The recent Unearthed Arcana article of new monastic traditions, which I examined in detail over in Tribality, was the kick in the pants I needed to work on developing another of my own. The monk’s meditative nature makes it a good fit for a subclass about dreams and astral travel, much as […]
New kinds of undead never go out of style, right? I hope not, anyway, because this post presents a new kind of undead, with four variants. The PCs in my campaign were wandering through the sewers under the city they live in when they ran into some undead, including a […]
You know, when I wrote the first post in this whole series, I said straight out that I wasn’t going to do separate posts for subraces, which was absolutely about my stomach-turning reluctance to try to write drow personalities that are remotely playable in group environments (but aren’t all clones […]
I’ve been writing a series on personality features for each individual non-human race for awhile now, and today – thanks to a request from a reader – I’m covering kobolds, one of the only remotely PC-playable races that even goblins can look down on. The lore around kobolds has changed a […]
Back in the 3.5 DMG II, there were magic items that benefited the whole party. I don’t remember the details of their design, and I’m deliberately not going back to look them up now, but I always liked the idea – company banners, totems, that kind of thing. I was […]
Inigo Montoya: You are using Bonetti’s Defense against me, ah? Man in Black: I thought it fitting considering the rocky terrain. Inigo Montoya: Naturally, you must expect me to attack with Capo Ferro? Man in Black: Naturally, but I find that Thibault cancels out Capo Ferro. Don’t you? Inigo Montoya: […]
I’ve been working for a good while now on unique personality features for each race. The exact implementation of these ideas is left to each DM – maybe you pick two or so of these and the rest from your actual Background, maybe you get additional personality features. The DMG […]
Note the paltry amount of filthy lucre. The piece is “Dragon Slayers and Proud of It,” by Larry Elmore. Last month, I talked about six different approaches to distributing cool treasure in tabletop games. Today I’m looking at the same question from a different angle. Let’s say you’ve figured out what’s […]
I am amused to discover that, just over 24 hours after I posted about feats and feat design (and how the fanbase is calling for more feats), the new Unearthed Arcana does the same. The article opens with a discussion of feat design philosophy, which I think is excellent, and […]
In my Aurikesh campaign, all of the characters belong to the Gallant Shields of Chardecum Mercenary Company. This is not very much like the private security companies of the modern day, and not (currently) all that much like the condottieri of Renaissance Italy that are their more direct inspiration. Instead of […]
