Best Version of DnD?

[Auberon]

There is always the 20ft rope & plank bridge that crosses a 20ft gorge filled with rushing water.  The PCs get a level appropriate chance to notice that the planks do not seem to be secured in a normal fashion.

 

Magic version: One side of the rope bridge is a magic rope.  When the command word is spoken it does its thing (climbs, tangles, whatever) which means it is no longer holding the planks the PCs are standing on in place.  The PCs fall into the water to sink like a stone or get swept away by the current.  Or maybe land on a boulder and take falling damage.  That fun is up to you.

 

Non-magic version: There is section of rope that needs to be pulled for the whole thing to unravel.  A smart creature might hide itself right by that section so it can jump out and pull when the PCs are halfway across.  A less intelligent creature might hide in some bushes or such 30ft away and then come charging towards the bridge.  A clever creature might also have a larger distraction appear behind it in order to make it appear that it is fleeing a greater danger.  Maybe it's a real ogre or maybe it's just a fake dragon head on some pulleys that suddenly rises in the background.  Either could freeze the PCs on the bridge and cause them to ignore the little guy charging the bridge.

 

Unless they notice he is running the scissors, in spite of mother's best advice.

 

And the leafy dragon seems cool until they realize that there is actually a firing platform built into it so a small creature can sit inside the head and shoot crossbow bolts out.

[etherial]

My favorite kobold trap is a pit trap full of dry leaves and a kobold with a torch waiting nearby.

[Dilvish the Deliverer]

Re: Stupid Goblin traps.  In a high ceilinged room/cavern you could have bungee jumping goblins that drop down and spear the adventurers.  Goblins is jars/baskets of oozes or swarms that they attempt to deliver into the midst of the adventurers.

[TheAuldGrump]

16 hours ago, BlazingTornado said:

Speaking of traps I need some good ones for Kobolds... and maybe a good way to use some Urds.

 

There's a lot of nice jungle trails and open areas... and all I put down so far is a pit trap... mostly because it was already set up for the map.

A 'fun' one for jungle trails is basically a very small pit trap - about foot sized... with stakes that are driven into the foot by the victim's own weight - imparting a 50% movement penalty.

 

Then add something nasty to it, so that the victim is exposed to Filth Fever.

 

The Auld Grump

[Doug Sundseth]

In addition to the punji sticks mentioned above, you could try muddy slides that might drop your PCs over cliffs (disguised by dead leaves), deadfall traps, swinging gate traps with spikes, leg breakers (small pit with weights designed to shift when you step in), spring-loaded bear traps, snares that lift the PCs by their legs (or necks) and possibly swing them into something unpleasant, rolling logs or stones, .... And if the trap needs to be set off, it could be set off by a physical trigger where the PCs are likely to walk, a magical trigger, or by command (tripped by somebody actually watching) to make sure the timing is right.

 

For the best effects, think about the likely responses of the PCs and set up sequences to take advantage: NPC shoots at PCs and runs, PCs chase and hit a pit trap, PCs gather to pull the fallen character out of the pit and a deadfall trap is set off over their heads. The combinations are endless.

 

For that matter, the Ewok battle in Return of the Jedi is a decent source for stupid goblin traps for use in forests. I'm pretty sure that Ewoks are just goblins with fur coats.

[TheAuldGrump]

3 hours ago, Doug Sundseth said:

For that matter, the Ewok battle in Return of the Jedi is a decent source for stupid goblin traps for use in forests. I'm pretty sure that Ewoks are just goblins with fur coats.

That is an insult to all goblins, everywhere....

 

The Auld Grump - but nothing matches the sheer majesty of the Star Wars Holiday Special....

[TheAuldGrump]

And, with Saturday's game, the (grown up) Beyond the Borderlands campaign is wrapped - they drove the evil spider queen from her hold in The First World into the space between The First World and the plane of Shadow... this will, of course, lead to absolutely no problems in the distant future.... 

 

She is not going to quite be a Lolth stand in, and is a lot less encouraging of conflict between the factions of her dark elves. (Who are only now becoming Drow - in the Pathfinder setting, evil elves can develop into Drow over time.)

 

They never solved the mystery of The King Under the Forest - but then I am not at all certain that they even know that there is a mystery of The King Under the Forest.... Which means that I can use it for the kids game.    (The one big downside of a sandbox game - the PCs will hit between a third and a half of the material you have for them.)

 

The PCs never interacted with the third Spider Queen at all - and, again, I am not sure that they even realize that there is a third Spider Queen. (The first is the Chaotic Good Weaver of Tales, the second is the Chaotic Evil Weaver of Deceit, and the third, unmet, is the Lawful Neutral Weaver of Fate.... There not being too many Lawful Neutral elves, she doesn't get a lot of exposure... The ones that do follow her are called The Grey.)

 

The Auld Grump

[Doug Sundseth]

In case anyone who cares doesn't know, there's a new Nickstarter that opened today. I won't say more for fear of violating commerce rules.

[TheAuldGrump]

Looking over my Humble Bundle gleanings from the Frog God/Kobold offering last year, I noticed Halls  of the Mountain King....

 

Thinking that it might be handy for the kids game, I finally got around to downloading it, and took a deeper look.

 

It bears enough similarities to what I already have planned that I really wish that I had looked at it earlier....

 

Lost dwarf holdings? Check.

Cursed treasure? Check.

Freemason dwarfs? Check. (This last was kind of a shock.... But there they are.)

Ties between Mammon and evil dwarfs? Check. (Different evil dwarfs, but that is easily remedied.)

 

Then add dwarf airships - which weren't in my own plans, but for a kids game? No problem!

 

And the level that the adventures start at are just about where the next series of sessions leave off - so I can use it to continue from where I leave off my own plottings....

 

The Auld Grump

[Unruly]

I just learned that my friends and I have been handling spellcasting in D&D wrong for years. We've always assumed that you needed to be able to see someone to cast something on them, unless it's an area effect. But apparently you don't need anything even remotely resembling line of sight unless the spell specifically says something like "a target you can see." At least that's the case in 5th edition, according to the Rules You Should Know section on the Dragon Talk podcast.

 

Go figure.

[Auberon]

I was just reading the 5E magic rules this past weekend, and that is indeed RAW.  However many attack spells specify "you can see" in their description.  You are also expressly forbidden from targeting creatures with total cover, so the application is still somewhat limited in scope.

[Tjrez]

1e Ad&D and the moldvay rule system. I like to keep it simple and the story moving, instead of being bogged down by rules. I currently run a campaign on roll20 and the players seems to like to add house rules as we go and are faced with em. When tsr wanted me to buy a whole new set of books every couple years I realized it was a marketing scam and not so much progression. Main idea is to have fun ;) so any of the systems will work well if you have a good group of players and vice verse. So keep swingiñ yer sword and collectin that gold and remember ...have fun

[Unruly]

11 hours ago, Auberon said:

I was just reading the 5E magic rules this past weekend, and that is indeed RAW.  However many attack spells specify "you can see" in their description.  You are also expressly forbidden from targeting creatures with total cover, so the application is still somewhat limited in scope.

Yea, and they also went on to say in the podcast that unless otherwise stated a spell is blocked by stuff like a pane of glass, because even though you can see through it, it still provides total cover. And if the spell is something like a fireball, it would explode on reaching the glass. They do point out that the cleric cantrip of Sacred Flame specifically doesn't get affected like that though, because it says it ignores all cover, so you could be hiding behind a Wall of Force or something and even though the wall provides total cover you're still getting hit by it.

 

So yea, it's a sort of weird situation where seeing isn't required unless it says so, but not seeing still provides total cover in most cases so you can't hit them for that reason. Unless they're behind glass, where they get total cover even though you can see them, meaning that you can't cast the spell at them, unless it says it ignores cover.

[Jokemeister]

3 hours ago, Unruly said:

Yea, and they also went on to say in the podcast that unless otherwise stated a spell is blocked by stuff like a pane of glass, because even though you can see through it, it still provides total cover. And if the spell is something like a fireball, it would explode on reaching the glass. They do point out that the cleric cantrip of Sacred Flame specifically doesn't get affected like that though, because it says it ignores all cover, so you could be hiding behind a Wall of Force or something and even though the wall provides total cover you're still getting hit by it.

 

So yea, it's a sort of weird situation where seeing isn't required unless it says so, but not seeing still provides total cover in most cases so you can't hit them for that reason. Unless they're behind glass, where they get total cover even though you can see them, meaning that you can't cast the spell at them, unless it says it ignores cover.

 

We always used to ignore rules in weird situations and instead go with "what made sense".  

 

Now that I think about it though, I have to wonder if that was a good approach.  We didn't always have a good handle on "what makes sense".

<remembers a Marvel SuperHeroes game where we threw a villain into an adamantium wall and the GM ruled that the villain took damage equal to the strength of the adamantium wall (strongest substance in the Marvel Universe!) which resulted in a villain death and corresponding penalties on our Heroes>

[BlazingTornado]

Ok so for the next adventure for my players there is an encounter with a number of creatures in some ancient jungle ruins.

But there's also a possible non-hostile... I was kind of looking at monster stat blocks across the books with an online tool and kind of landed on the character of Izek Strazni from Curse of Strahd and he looked cool and he was originally going to be in cahoots with the young white dragon out for revenge against the party, but given his feature of having this horrible demonic arm, it got my wheels turning...

And now I envision him as being a former pit fighter who lost his arm in one fight that didn't go his way and got a "fresh" arm from the evil cult the party tangled with before in exchange for servitude. He doesn't really mind either way, he's a brute, this arrangement means he gets to kill people, although in this case he's really just here as an observer... He's here to monitor the party. If they show up and die, he can report back to the cultists, if they show up and succeed... preserve the dragon's remains. I'm sure the cult could use a dracolich in its nefarious purposes.

 

Anyway, I'm just wondering if I should keep the character's name and/or appearance intact... This is what the module depicts him as:

 

 

The other thing is... he's of some reknown as a pit fighter so how do I determine if the players recognize him? Do I flat-out ask them to roll or should I wait for them to inquire?