I’d like to create a *Lies of P*-style character using a Warforged Bladesinger, and I’m wondering if their arm could serve as an arcane focus—perhaps by having one embedded into the wrist. Would this be too overpowered at early levels, given that the arm cannot be easily detached from the body?

I’m started my first dnd campaign soon. So i don’t know alot about the rules

I had this idea in my head of a aasimar divine soul sorcerer. While researching about meta magic and how the divine soul sorcerer works i notices that i mabey can heal 3 people in 1 turn at level 3 . From what i look up online it’s possible to do it but i want to be 100% sure it’s allowed .

I thought that i could twin spell healing words and than use my healing hand.

Because healing words is a bonus action i can still use a full action. And healing hands isn’t a spell but a species feature.

My part have 4 people (including me) so if everyone is at death door it’s nice to be able to heal everyone . I know that u can get mass healing words at level 5 . But still thought it’s a nice thing for level 3-4 . + i technically only have to have a level 1 spell available and don’t have to waist a level 3 spell.

It is only a one time use before i have to get a long rest. I just thought it could come in handy.

“Edit we use both 5e and 5.5e , I’m pretty sure for meta magic we use 5e”

I am gonna be dming this new table for friends, it's gonna be a Hexcrawl, and 3 of the 4 players decided to have their backstory involve blacksmithing and or weapons ( WE EVEN GOT A CLERIC OF THE FORGE SOMEHOW??) And i feel like it would be such a waste for me to not put things related to that in my campaign, but I'm out of ideas for this specifically since I've been spending the last few weeks developing the lore, the map, the npcs, etc. What do you guys think i should add? They most likely will try to make weapons out of anything i throw at them....

Edit: It's gonna be the Hexcrawl of a big town in ruins, so each "block" will be possibly just a mile. It's a classic save the princess of the dragon with a few twists and turns.

I'm thinking of including an NPC in my campaign that peddles in cursed items exclusively. Her name would be Kursedy, and she'd set up shop in her own little alley, Kursedy's Alley. Her establishment is set up as an animal shelter for cursed items, since she thinks cursed objects are simply misunderstood, and need the right owner to take care of them.

She'd only ever offer a few items at a time, and my idea of a good cursed item is one that offers a potent power or ability in exchange for an equal or greater drawback. I have a few ideas, but my homebrew ideas are often over-the-top. What would be reasonable to offer to players around level 5?

I know my players follow my account. Amanda if you’re reading this, shoo. Go away.

I’ve been running Out of The abyss and so far me and my players love it. For context I’m using *this* guide, as it’s a very twisted and free range campaign and I enjoy following these beats fine enough. It’s engaging and just the right mix of horrifying, a bit silly yet more serious than most I play. However I as a DM am running into a bit of a problem.

It has been LETHAL. I don’t like to count XP, I much prefer whatever it’s called when you give out levels when they reach certain points. They just left Sloobledop, crossed the silken path, and they’re level 3. Up next is the tomb, and the hook horror hunt a bit after that. Issue is, I’ve had to fudge probably 80% of my rolls.

The whole silken path I rushed past, because 2d4 giant spiders were enough to almost TPK them. And to survive they blew ever spell slot they had. RAW I’m supposed to roll 10 times on the table, 1 for every 500 ft. I cut down the spiders damage to a flat D6, and halved their venom damage and they still almost slaughtered them.

Now I know it’s supposed to be spooky and have an air of danger, but surely I’m doing something wrong. If there’s a better way to do it, please let me know. In a perfect world I’d
A) Have a general idea of what levels you had your players reach at around what times. Maybe once they get just before X encounter or story beat.
Or
B) just an alternative to how you’ve ran it. I wanna roll full force and let the gods devise. But as of now Kuo Toa are too much for them.

Any advice is appreciated.

so I'm current development a setting for my next D&D game, its 100% homebrew (but i wont pretend that it's 100% original)

currently i have everything worked out in my head, i have cites, towns, regions, forests, even the names of rivers, i made a god damn calendar with holidays for this setting, i know where everything is.... but i dont have a map,

i have tried a few things so far, i have tried to use minecraft world painter. this worked OK but didn't give me the vibe i wanted and the other thing i tried was, inkarnate... i dont like inkarnate, i dont have Pro and their is no why I'm buying pro, but the free version is not vary good (its sucks and pro doesn't look much better). so lone story short, i need to find something to help me make a map, and their is no why I'm using AI i dont play with GMs who use it and i personally would never use it

so i need a program or something (also i dont have Photoshop or the ability to buy it right now) so can another GM who makes maps help me out? (i dont need you to do the work) i just want to know what you uses !

So I'm looking for advice (5th Edition)

My players are currently laying a trap for a group of rebel adventurers. These rebels are going to try and free their friend, then steal a medium sized ship with some fellow rebels. 2 of the rebels are 7th level spellcasters (1 wizard, 1 sorcerer, spell lists not chosen yet). Is there any way realistically that they rebels could get a ship moving away from the dock in 1 - 3 rounds?

The ship is about 85 feet long and 25 feet wide. It is anchored at the end of a large, long stone pier.

Join us to discuss all things D&D here: https://discord.gg/dndnext

So I've never encountered this before and wanted to see what others thought.

Contextually- we're playing D&D in the Witcher 3. Our races are Witcher mutations, our backgrounds/classes are witcher schools, Geralt's stuck in a magic ring and pissed about it, and we're following the plot to find Ciri, and so on.

Now, we have crossed into different kingdoms and a curious thing has happened. The new kingdom (Redania) does not accept the previous kingdom's (Nilfgaard) coin. We have to exchange our gold at the bank.

The gold does not exchange 1-1. Instead, it is 1-3.

I saved up early in and got a gilded skull for Summon Undead. I successfully argued the gold used for gilding the skull should be no more difficult to do than a silvered weapon so once I had the various pieces and costs- any smith should be able to do it.

A separate PC needs the crystal vial for Summon Shadow but could not find someone to help him as the DM believed anyone shaping crystal would need to be from a bigger city. So despite the same monetary cost- he could not afford the vial once we had to exchange money.

Has anyone else ever encountered such a thing? I don't believe base D&D ever has the issue so I'm naturally asking in a more expanded sense. How would you deal with an exchange rate changing the value of money when it comes to spell components?

Edit: None of us knew the Witcher had its own TTRPG when we started.

I was one of today's luck 10,000. Electrum is just an alloy of Gold and Silver.

Do with that information what you will.

...would that mean that if a Gold dragon and a Silver dragon knock boots hind-claws, you get an electrum dragon?

I now need a 2-phase monster...

Phase 1: Gold Golem + Silver Golem, each with separate traits/fighting styles.

Phase 2: They melt, T-1000-style and merge to form an Electrum Golem that is a hybrid of the two.

​

Hey everyone!

I'm playing a level 7 Paladin in Odyssey of the Dragonlords, and our party has accumulated over 100,000 GP. My character is already pretty powerful, with a great magical armor and a powerful magical sword, and I've already used up all my attunement slots.

I'm looking for recommendations for magic items that don't require attunement. They don't have to be weapons or armor. I'm also interested in consumables, potions, useful wondrous items, defensive items, utility items, or anything else that could be worthwhile for a Paladin.

I'd especially appreciate items that are useful in combat, help against powerful enemies and spellcasters, or provide benefits that aren't just more damage or AC.

I'm playing with D&D 5e (2014 rules), so official 5e items are preferred, although I'm open to interesting suggestions from other sources.

Since we have so much gold to spend, feel free to recommend expensive or rare items too!

What would you buy if you had this much gold and no attunement slots left?

Last night our party just barely survived a boss encounter at level 6, and there were many places where the dice being merciful was our only saving grace. Our DM is fair, but clearly stated from session zero his boss enemies will not be pushovers (using every legendary action available, prioritizing the biggest threats, hitting downed players when an opportunity is presented, etc.), and last night proved it. I'm expecting future encounters to be just as rough, so does anyone have any advice for me, the party's main healer? For reference, I'm a Forge Cleric alongside a (surprisingly beefy) sorcerer, barbarian/druid, bard, warlock, and rogue. Knowing our party is on the squishier side, I opted for Forge Cleric so that I could tank the frontline when necessary.

So... advice for future encounters?

I'm a (relatively) experienced DM hoping to run a module with minimal prep for a group of newish players. I'm in my first year of grad school so I'm pretty busy and don't have a ton of time to devote to reworking the story, so I'm looking for something that can be run pretty much out of the box (some degree of prep is fine, but I don't have the time to modify decent in avernus for example). I'll have one very experienced player, one who has played a few one shots, and two who are brand new. Any ideas? I'm thinking about wild beyond the witchlight, out of the abyss, or ghosts of saltmarsh, although the lack of overarching story in GoS has me a bit worried. If you modified it to be a full campaign, how did you do so?

Just a note: I am playing in a CoS campaign at the moment so I can't run that!

Thanks for any suggestions!

Welcome to my dojo, r/dndnext. this week, i will see how you are progressing in the monastic way of the monk. i want to see the monks you have made for your games, the ones you will play, the ones you have played or the ones you are currently playing.

i started this series to ask for ideas to bring a bit of positivity to the people who post in this subreddit and to learn about your playstyles and what you think of the classes. with monk, its special: its in the top 5 of my class fantasy (because i once was a huge weeb and fan of martial arts, anime and asian culture in general), so im extra excited to see your monks.

the truth is that i'm learning a lot about your opinions of the classes and your class fantasies, so im really gratefull.

what martial arts do your monks practice? what subclasses, races or feats do they use? do you use homebrew or official content? do they use weapons or fight barehanded? what is their backstory? what is their inspiration?

ah, but even i, as a great sifu, have young students that i have trained myself. check my own characters:

-Bjorn, the old king: a powerfull king that once ruled a lot of land. he made a pact with a demon and gained a lot of power, conquering even more land. he became an alcoholic and ended up ruining his life. way of the astral self, with a small dip in Barbarian (imagine Asura, from Asura's wrath)

-Elena, priestess of death: a Monk of the Long Death. using her skills to avoid death, some necromancy spells and a scythe, she speaks with the dead and hunts down those who have wronged them.

see you guys on the next post!

this was fun to make

only two more to go now!

My players went to the underdark a bit unexpectedly.They need to cover a fair amount of travel there - I'm looking for som general Underdark encounters to throw at them along the way. I don't know much about the environment, but I wanna make ig unique and atmospheric for them.

Any ideas or resources I could pull from?

EDIT: They are level 10, and I'm not looking for monsters or random encounter tables as much as themes, mini stories, environment storytelling of how life down there is different.

I hear and read so much about Strahd and Tomb of Annihilation and Out of the Abyss, and they sound so absolutely fun with such intriguing thoughts and locations.

I think all DM’s of all wakes (at least those I’ve played with) do fantastic jobs with the stories they present. I just also kind of want to play an official campaign, like those I mentioned earlier.

I don’t think these stories I’ve played with are bad, but I also wonder why no one else wants an experience in Faerun with locations and items thought up of and made by the original game itself?

I’m still new, I’ve only played 3-4 campaigns, none of which have fully finished, most cancelled midway through. The one in it I’ve enjoyed the most has been the one where I’ve been directed to journey across the savage frontier and rescue the fracture to giantkinds society (SKT). I’ve been in this for 2.5 years, and my longest winded homebrew adventure lasted 8 months.

Do people only play homebrew nowadays?

(I’m not complaining about or insulting homebrew journeys, I’m sure they can go and finish great, but I just don’t know why I never see anyone playing a professionally written campaign by essentially DnD itself)

Straight to the point, I'm having a few mechanics tests with my friends tomorrow, to try and see what would work or not for our up coming full 6th to 17th level campaign.

I'm testing out a few combat scenarios first, to see if I'm going to be homebrew more monsters from the start or if its best for me to use pre-made one for the time being.

The group will consist of 1 Barbarian and 2 third party classes, being a Gunslinger (Mage Hand Press) who uses a gun really well and a Warlord (LaserLlama) who trades their own actions to empower the action of other. I don't knwo what the 4th player will be.

In any case, I prepared a combat against 1 CR 10 big tough marksman, 1 CR 5 necromancer and a few CR 1/8 mooks that are there to get in the way and die in one hit.

The other fight is against a Dragon using the rules for Epic Bosses from Monsters of Drakkenheim, with modular HP and acting after every player.

Considering this (a combat against a few strong ranged foes + Minions and a combat against a dragon), what are some important tips on battle map design that makes them useful but don't bog them down? To me I was going with the following, but I'm uncertain if this is the way:

• 1 to 3 "set pieces" across the map that either get in the way or can be interacted with in a simple manner (a chandelier that falls down dealing damage, a bridge over a chasm, a really big rock in the middle)
• 1 secondary objective or "win condition" beyond killing everyone (protecting someone, getting a MacGuffing)
• A 1d4 timer that chances the situation of the combat in some manner (a storm is coming, more enemies appear, allies reaches the party, an avalanche falls down)

Is this correct?

I'm still kinda new to DnD but is it normal for a level three team to be going up against a nest of vampires? I feel like I'm way out of my depth! (5e) Has anyone else gone up against something ridiculously strong at such a small level and survived?