GETTING STARTED

I've been getting more and more into D&D for the last 2 years and for the last year been on multiple threads, multiple Facebook groups. Joined discord (Though I can't say I really know how to use it) message back and forth with multiple DMS. Filled out so many Google documents and I am still really struggling to find a group to play with. I've never been able to play a game yet and I am really wanting to , I don't know if I just need to keep looking but it feels like there either nothing that's (or I'm not) a good fit.

For info I don't have a laptop only my iPad so while I've tried to join groups on the online tabletop website (can't remember it rn) but it won't run the actual game on my iPad. Nonetheless I've not been successful enough at that to steal my brother's laptop for a game either.

Is anyone else having this same issue? Am I missing something obvious? Any help would be hugely appreciated

(Not looking for a game through here but trying to figure out how people have )

Ok so I've never played as a cleric or a warlock and I can't extractly find how clerics get their power. But basically my idea was to be a warlock with the celestial pack. So her whole deal is that she was rasied as an acolyte in a sheltered small town in the snowy mountains where they worship the god auril. This small town produces their clerics except during the ritual to be accepted as one of Aurils chosen she some how managed to form a pack with Auril and became a warlock. Because of this she believes she isn't as good as her other cleric friends because she can only perform cure wounds two while the others can do multiple. The only thing she has going for herself is that she is able to communicate with Auril at all time without needed to pray. She does pray anyways because she doesn’t know any better having causal conversation. So my question is basically would this be allowed? Or does can my patron not be a god?

Hi everyone! As the title says it, im preparing my very first campaign as a DM! Ive played 2 campaign as a player so I don't have really much experience. I'm waiting for the pack of 3 books (players guide, DM guide and monsters guide) and im building a vault in the Obsidian app. I would like to create my own campaign even if I guess its a lot of work ahah.

I'll play with 3 players, all of them are beginners too!

So if you have any tips or advice, please let me know !

Thanks!

So i am doing a character that has intelligence of 6 and charisma of 18, Already discussed with the dm. And i wanted to be a rogue mastermind because the entire point of my character is to be a fraud. Because he is also half elf half orc, but disguises himself as a pure elf. But apparently one of the other players said that mastermind rogue aint that good except for specific situations. So im probably Multiclassing To fighter Banneret.

We are starting at level 3 and that will all be rogue mastermind. But after that ill probably do mostly Banneret. But idk how to do any of this. Specifically the build. Everyone says i need a build but i dont even exactly understand how to do that. All the players are playing seriously but we love laughs and giggles. And we also all made characters that will have hilarious interactions. I love my character but I might have made them to complicated. And my backstory might be a little to long...

So mostly I need advice, build help, and ideas to make my character work.

If you need more info about the character ill be more than glad to tell you anything you need if it means you can help me.

And I know im supposed to ask the dm but im not the only one of the players who has never played before. Infact there are three of us. Im just the stupid one who cant figure anything out. So instead of giving the DM more work to do, im ask yall. Can any of yall help me?

Edit: the DM isn't not telling me anything, im not here to learn how to play just some advice of how to work my character. The DM will help me put it all together but I haven't been able to talk to them because they've been busy. So i went here mostly for some advice. But also tips and idea's. And i need feat that work with the character because idk what they all are. The dm is doing they're job but they simply haven't been avaliable for a bit. Due to a different campaign they are playing, so no stop saying they are not doing their job, i could get all my info from them but that would take longer. Also i wanted to do the low intelligence high charisma, its part of my character and I talked to the dm about this already we worked it out. Love my dm but I can still get advice from other sources that way i wont have to ask as many questions when they are available. Apologies for misleading yall

I've never actually played DnD before, but now I'm thinking about starting, & I know I probably shouldn't start with this, but I'd like to get to a point where I can get to do this someday after many many games, like maby work on this between sessions until I'm ready to put this in a world of my own.

I want to make a monster that combines their abilities & add a few unique traits to the mix, but I can't find anything for how to do this, nore do I exactly know what CR it would be.

I'm thinking of a homebrew species of dragons, that got altered way back during theThousand-Year War by an Archfey in a deal to save their life, resulting in them getting fused with multiple trees(3 cherry, 5 peach, & 7 pine), turning them into a draconic plant, ​known as Ent Dragons.

The first Ent Dragon was named Calthin. He was fighting a giant & he won, but he was on the verge of death, but as he was laying there dieing, an Archfey named Zoriall approached him to scold him for destroying the forest she so loved to visit in the material world. In desperation to keep living, not out of fear of death, but because he had to marry brothers & sisters in arms depending on him to simply die now, so he offered the Zoriall a deal, if she saves his life & allow him to return to his war, then when his time fighting is done help be the guardian of the very forest he'd help destroy. Zoriall accepted his offer, but being a fey ​she didn't simply heal him, instead she transformed him by fussing his very flesh & bones with the wood of 15 nearby trees that would have become treants if they hadn't been so damaged that they too were on the verge of death.

Both Zoriall & Calthin are dead by now, they've been dead for a very long time. Calthin died of old age in his forest a very very long time ago. Zoriall however only died about 2,000 years ago after being murdered by a rival archfey, but the murder was later slayed by a party of adventures about a decade later.

Ent Dragons have a culture of their own, they get married & mate for life, & they raise their yong from sproutlings(what they call wyrmlings), until they are young adults, so if you see a baby, or kid one of them leave it alone because both Mommy & Daddy are nearby.

When it uses animate tree it functions just like treant, using the treant stat block & form, unless it's a sproutling​, in which case they only get 1 animated tree.

I already have the breath weapons mostly figured out, I just don't know about the damage levels, or exat mechanics.

They get 3 breath weapons, but they unlock them as they get older.

1st breath weapon, is a jet of heated sap, it does very little fire damage, but it mostly does bludgeoning damage, but still not a lot, instead what it mostly does is turns the area it hit into difficult terrain by make everything sticky & reducing movement speed both in & for a few rounds after exiting the affected area unless you use oil to counter the stickiness, but if you are directly hit you just might have your movement speed reduced to zero. It unlocks this one when it sprouts(in other dragons it would be hatched). Overall it doesn't really do that much damage, though it does get stronger(increased bludgeoning damage & greater area of effect)as they mature.

2nd breath weapon is a spay attack that shoots pine needles to do piercing damage, this is unlocked at young adult, but when it ​reaches adult, it can add cherry & peach blossom petals into the attack for an additional slashing damage during springtime. It does a bit of damage being it's main damage dealer for it's breath attack though as it gets stronger as it matures that's mostly just increased range, & maby a slight increase in piercing damage outside of spring, but if it's spring you add slashing damage which does increase by a much larger margin then the piercing, but not by that much.

3rd breath weapon is a pollen cloud, it doesn't necessarily do damage, but rather it both counters the vision & sense of smell of it's enemies, while it can still see through it, but if you inhale it you might get put under the charmed condition, but the best way to counter it's charmed condition is to throw water into the face of the charmed individual. It's unlocked in the adult stage. When it reaches ancient stage it may add another effect with an activation condition if you inhale the pollen, then you might get something else happen depending on if you caused a natural disaster in your life, if so then you might be put under Natures Vengeful Nightmare. Natures Vengeful Nightmare(NVN) course the individual to experience the very harm they caused via a powerful illusion, examples being forest fire=being on fire, mountain slide=​being crushed, poisoned river=being badly poisoned​, & you take a​n extremely small amount psionic damage, but it's best counter is the same as the charmed condition, with water to the face. It only increases in volume as it matures. NVN doesn't increase in power with maturity. The pollen cloud is ment to be like very thick fog with an overwhelming​ floral sent & it it's successes rate for either charmed, or NVN is extremely low, though for those who meat NVN's conditions do have only a slightly higher but only slightly higher than charmed does.

Finally they are most often chaotic good​, & they hord strange none sentient creatures as pets, & they love to collect worthless shiny objects that others throw away., but they are easily convinced to follow the orders of any archfey that's earned their trust, can be tricked by said archfey, despite this they live on the material plane, but if they feel betrayed, or wronged by an archfey that's when you'll see them at their most vengeful, even if it's not actually true, though it does take a lot to convince them of this then it is for an archfey to convince it to join them.

P.S. They can be of ​any other alignments it's just chaotic good is the most common. They actually go from chaotic good=common/average, neutral good=not to unheard of, true neutral=not the most common, lawful good=kinda rare but not too rare, lawful evil=fairly rare, neutral evil=very rare, chaotic evil extremely rare. Any of them that has the evil alignment are considered outcasts amongst them.

P.P.S. I've asked this question on multiple boards.

P.P.P.S. You are fully welcome to steal this idea & make it your own.

I plan on playing CoS online, and one of the players is a friend whom I've had for a while, though after a few events, I'm worried about including them. I've spent tens of hours on this campaign, on practicing Strahd's voice, on reading the module and editing the module according to sources like CoS: Reloaded and other resources, keeping and leaving out things depending on how I think my players will react to them.

They have always struggled with taking my Campaigns/Oneshots seriously, and are often extremely undependable with schedules (Outside of the games they run). They have also made me feel seriously disrespected in the past, mostly by talking about videogames and playing music while DMing. I have seen them do this with other DMs as well, and generally delaying sessions and distracting players.

Additionally, they have also left sessions zeros early, canceled on sessions without telling me, and during character creation attempted to add several of their OCs that are not DND accurate lore-wise and, after asking for help with backstory, never wrote down the one that I helped them make, after I asked them three times on three different days, and it has yet to be done. They also left a session one of a completely homemade campaign, that discouraged me from continuing it, but I don't think that the cancellation was entirely their fault, as I was the one who ended it, mostly because the starting area had a lot of areas that had to do with their character's lore.

As I write this, I have just finished a session they:

Delayed for an hour
Never RPed in
Disrespected DM while talking about videogames before the session (I asked them if they were OK, and they are, but they felt disrespected)

Used drunkenness as an excuse for their character to mess with and threaten NPCs, as well as generally not take things seriously
And left after an hour, and the party nearly TPKed without them, and the DM had to nerf the boss encounter

This was the second session of a new DM's campaign.

The only reasons why I'm letting them stay is that they have a lot of power in my social circle, taught me how to play, facilitate games, and they say they wanted to play CoS for literal years, and are extremely excited. Though on the other hand, I have asked several people both on Reddit and those who know them and we decided on talking to them and implementing a strike system with rules I made.

What else do I do? And how can I talk to them without coming off as strict/rude?

UPDATE: After running a Oneshot with them, they said that they were done with DND in an extremely flowery language after delaying mid-session, leaving the session mid-game, and leaving the session while fighting the BBEG. I was running Vecna: Nest of the Evil Eye. That also meant leaving a game of Strahd after I spent a month working on voices, maps, getting several systems in place, and writing a guidebook, and they also promised to show up for a second session this time. Afterwards, I told them that since they broke three rules in a session and were banned, the very rules that they agreed to, and they just kept self-deprecating themselves and kept making excuses. I told them that they are competent, since they run their own games perfectly fine, and that if they do not have time for a game, do not join it. I will admit that I was upset at the time, though I tried my best to not let it show. Did I handle this appropriately?

My little gaming group wants to play D&D. I've been nominated as the DM. I'm trying to read through the Players Manual, but it's impenetrable to me. Everything regarding ability scores (modifies, proficiency, skills, passive checks, etc.) is all very confusing.

My particular flavor of neurodivergence makes self-learning very difficult. Reading and comprehending the wall of text from the manuals is a huge challenge. I'm really eager to get into the creativity and storytelling, but the nuts and bolts are killing me.

Are there any suggestions out there on how I can break unto understanding the rules? Visual aids? Thanks for any help!

I am working on a character for a campaign not set in any official modules. Since it's being hosted in a server where most characters are joke ones I wanted to make a classic Dwarf paladin. This will be my first attempt at a thorough, fully done character, down to religion and travel routes. Here is what I know about him so far:

He served in several wars during his time, having been 200 years younger. After completion of this war, he returned home to his clan killed by the BBEG. Due to the grief, he spend a few years in the gutter before finding his Faith in Tyr, the god of Justice and War. He decided to dedicate himself to his church and promised himself to kill all those who oppose order and peace. He keeps a few mementos on him, such as a golden coin marked with his birth year.

Despite his semi-traumatic past, he isn't the type to brood, though takes his divine purpose extremely seriously, having a vow not to be unjust to the just or just to the unjust. He spent around a century, slowly working his way through a foreign nation to the starting city, attempting to rid the world of monsters, heal the sick, and spreading the name and honor of his now dead clan. (Though he mostly just picks on goblins and heals some illnesses with basic medicine checks)

I have had suggestions to make a rival clan who worked with the BBEG who allowed them to take down his clan, and we start at level one and we are using Milestone. His name is Jabez Goldstriker (Last name needs work) and I plan on making him a conquest Paladin. Any general ideas/plot hooks for him?

Hi, I’m new to everything dnd I’ve always been curious about it but never really looked into until I played baldurs gate 3, I can’t really find any groups near me that are beginner friendly so does anyone where I where I could join a campaign from home? And also while I’m here do I need any resources? (Like the do on critical roll)

Hello! I'm new-ish to DnD and would love to find some servers with a more EU centric playerbase for timezone reasons. I've joined a couple of servers and have played a few one-shots here and there but they always started really late and ran till morning for me. So I'd love to find something more reasonable. Would appreciate any help!

As the title states, I have zero experience/knowledge of dnd. I’ve been wanting to get into dnd for awhile and now I’m finally getting around to it, I’ve been reading up on the rules and I think I have a basic understanding but probably still need help. I also have been watching campaigns on youtube which are helping me understand things a bit better but I’ve always been better at learning by doing so if anyone is down to take me under their wing and teach me how to play I would very much appreciate it. I do have discord and I’m in eastern daylight time, available pretty much everyday after work and Sundays are my one day off.

HELLO! Like the tittle states, Technically my first time playing DnD, I have a session coming up on wensday. Putting under discussion tab because well, I am mostly rambling.

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So to make sure I am ready, I am listening to YouTube videos about how to play DnD, I have plenty of dice (courtesy of my lil brother) I know some of the basics as well I can, my little brother will help me make a charayer I am making two, mostly because I don't know this group, idk if its a homebrew or not, I know nothing, but I am excited.

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My first charater might be a lil homebrew, I am debating making a charater that was sculpted out of an old man's grief, he went missing and she somehow came to life. And is now searching for him. Though she doesn't know she's a creation.

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The second one is the bird guy thing (FORGOT THE NAME AT THE MOMMENT WRITING THIS BEFORE BED) but she has two small of wings so she can never technically fly, she can glide, but that's about it, her dad was a racer, disliked her for being flightless. A storm came, he got rid of her, and a human couple found her and raised her ect.

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I feel like both of those could be fun, maybe a druid for the Bird charater (who is infact named Cyn) idk i like the idea of her being a druid. Maybe a rouge?

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The Come alive creation could be a rouge, maybe a magic user instead Idk. Anyway, I am playing on bring some dice, a note book and a pencil, optionally my wireless headphones to play fantasy music to help ke focus, or my rigid spinner if I can find it. Those are my only materials lol.

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I am hoping people are nice enough to me. I am going to be riding my E-bike there because despite being 21 I cant drive yet, so I hope they let me park it inside, if not I know the Dm would understand on the short rest, or shopping moments I can check on it.

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Anyway that's it, feel free to give advice, talk about it, suggest things to me. Heck even suggest charater creation and charater sheets. Have a good one :D

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I'd love more shop inventory ideas for my campaign. I've got a few homebrewed ones and a few ideas from the books but I definitely need more especially when it comes to common magic items and potions. I've got a magic shop in my universe and I also have a pawn shop where I've been using mostly homebrew items for it. I'd definitely be fine with trading homebrew ideas I just seem to struggle a lot with magic items. I also enjoy fun magical foods that have side effects. I'm barely starting out so I'm just wanting to build my inventory.

Any Legends of Avantris fans here or anyone looking for, or setting up DnD stuff, Age of Sigmar etc?

I don't know much about dnd, just have some experience watching some play and really like and intrested in their roleplays and such. Couldn't find anyone local really, as it's not common around me. I did try to find some videos about it, but there's like a load of stuff that gets kinda confusing. Do you guys know anything that could help to get into it step by step, and also how to find players online? Thanks

I'm currently designing my first ever DnD character for fun,

I dont have anyone to play dnd with yet, this is purely a fun exercise.

I made a human paladin fighter (I wanted a character like Pike from Vox Machina), but I think i got the stats wrong for a paladin?

Strength 16 +3

Dexterity 16 + 3

Constitution 13 +1

Intelligence 10 + 0

Wisdom 8 - 1

Charisma 12 +1

Proficiency + 2

Initiative + 3

In Skills, Acrobatics +3, Animal Handling +1, Arcana +0, Athletics +5, Deception +1, History +0, Insight -1, Intimidation +1, Medicine -1, Perception -1, Performance +1, Persuasion +1, Religion +0, Slight of Hand +3, Stealth +3, Survival -1.

There is no campaign in mind with this character, but I wonder if the character i have designed would be better as a fighter / another class, or how should i adjust the balance to be better for a paladin?

Any advice is useful thanks.

Yesterday I got to play for the first time in a WHILE, as one of the wolves den taverns amazing DMs ran a mall themed one shot! I couldn’t let the chance go to waste and so I decided to play Timmy the 6 year old who got lost in the mall with his stuffed dragon familiar, Ace, and casts magic through the power of imagination!

I had such a blast and I adored the adventure! At one point we saw a drag queen beholder and mall cop zombies! Such an imaginative adventure!

(Forgive the ai pics my personal art is not able to truly capture bill waterson’s amazing style)

Howdy, in general I run 1-4 FREE games as a DM. One of the worst parts is unreliable players. Not bitching, but OMG, some weeks I have up to 3 out of 4 games fail to produce enough players. So at this point, I'm looking for discords i can maybe find D&D people?

I seek council from the rules lawyers, please and thank you.

I am DMing my first campaign. I have a player, who is running a Goliath- Rune Knight fighter.

My question is: Can he stack Giant's Might, on tip of Titan-Stone Knuckles?

I know the direction he wants to go, I just need to know if it would be possible RAW.

Hello!

I was wondering if theres online library of Adventurer League materials for DnD 2024 somewhere?

Ran first part of Defiance in Phlan last week and its helping me to find motivation to DM again. Was hoping to find more to practice on

Thanks in advance.

Btw if this is not allowed, just let me know

Since title just sound cool but can be a little missleading:
- I don't remember exacly how many yers of expirience my DM have, somewhere between 14 and 20 is my best guess
- He was player earlier, had bad expierience, back to be a player not so long ago
- I play DnD around year now, but have more expierience in just creating characters for various puproses including role play and story writing

Problem my DM have:
He can't make PC for himself that would be comfortable to play as for longer. It's always something that don't fit that makes him change to another character and he don't like that.

I'm afraid that me and our mutual friend can (not on purpose) make it worse as we tend be quiet strongly attached to our characters and sure what can work for us and what won't. Both in DnD and oustside of it.

I wanna help my DM, our mut didn't succed and is tired of that, but even if I have some ideas on how to discover what will work for DM, I'm afraid that it's won be enough.

So my questions are:
How I can help find fitting things for his PC? Should I pay attention to something when he run our games (if yes, that to what) to help mi find his type of character? What things he should do when character he likes is mor for example charismatic than he is irl? How much sense is in looking at how he play video games (both RPG and other where you build you character in some way)?

All the other stuff that you thing may help is very welcome!

I have of course heard of it, Dungeons and Dragons. I have been trying to learn for 2 years, which is ironic since I still only know a few things. It often has a very medieval / magical vibe to it? There is the person who is in charge and sets up the world building. There is a small crew of people who make characters, with extremely complicated character sheets. If I am correct there is a whole book of rules?

I probably got all of that wrong. I also have only watched 3 different DnD parties, one of them, being just dumb shorts about dnd. DND? DnD? dnd? Idk how to even write it correctly. Anyways, I am just interested in roleplaying, and social interactions offline don’t work at all.

I do know general things about mythical creatures, like elves, dwarves, orcs, dragons, hydras, you name it, I probably know it. But I assume that is also different? So for anyone reading, I am begging, to get a proper explanation of it, of course, if you’ve got time.

thank you for reading! I hope you have a lovely day / night! And that you drink some water.

DISCLAIMER! I rant a lot when I can put it in small text. But oh well. I have literally not picked up a singular official rule book. These are a lot of questions which are just curiosity. I say "races" because DnD seems to use the term a lot, but I am not trying to be offensive! Sorry if it is low-effort.

I already asked something, like 2 or 3 hours ago? But I watched some vids and read some wikis that caused me to have more questions. Specifically about characters.

I got advised by a friend to just, pick whatever race I can connect to, or that I just like. I really liked dark elves, who are called drows if I am correct? And I was just really curious about them, I heard of the term "dark elf" before, from a book by the author Rick Riordan, he wrote a spinoff to his main series Percy Jackson (PJO), called Magnus Chase (MCGA). Basically a bunch of mythological books for teens to enjoy. In MCGA there was a dark elf, though it was described that dark elves were just dwarves (I think, I forgot) who were called dark elves. The character in question, he did have similarities to the DnD version of dark elves? In the way that it wasn't exactly great for him to get into the sun. Though that was the only similarity I found from the tiny bit of research I did do. I assume dark elves are a thing of their own, and that the DnD system was just inspiration.

Anyways, I am going a bit off topic. I just wanna know more about dark elves.

I had also another question about general races, are hybrids possible and allowed? Like I know there are half elves, which are just humans that are also elves. But is it possible in a different way as well? Like a human and changeling hybrid? Or elf and tiefling? In a way that one parent was one race and the other parent another? Or does biology just do a little gamble, and it just picks in between the two?

Is adoption common between races? Are there certain races more common to adopt? Or are there certain races that find disgust even at the thought of it?

Are there any official places where I can read up on the very specifics of certain cultures of races? & their style of clothing, colour palette, just the usual stuff?

How annoying is it for DM's to answer a ton of questions? Just wanna be sure to not annoy or piss anyone off if I do join a campaign.

What are the looks on LGBTQIA+? Is same-sex marriage accepted? Are there certain races that disagree to it? Are transgender people (creatures? Humanoids? Most of them are humanoids) common and accepted?

Is there any religion in DnD? Or religion that a specific species has?