Michael E. Shea's Blog, page 28

The Minimum Viable D&D Game

What is the minimum preparation we need to run a great D&D game? In a previous article we've explored what we might do if we spend an entire day preparing for a D&D game and Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master already boils down game preparation so we can spend less time preparing for our D&D games, instead focusing on what we need to improvise the game when we run it.

Today we're going to start from the ground up, looking at what preparation we might put together to have enough to run a great game.

The D&D Essentials Kit is a great example of the minimum you need to play D&D. The kit includes fourteen adventure locations that take characters from 1st to 6th level. Many of these adventures are only two pages long. We can learn a lot from the Essentials Kit as a model of the pure simplicity of D&D.

How much do we really need to have ready for our D&D games so we and our players can have some fun?

A Strong Start

Second only to reviewing the characters, the strong start is a critical component of a D&D game. How does the game begin? What happens to draw the players into the game? What hooks the characters into the rest of the adventure? We often don't need more than a sentence to describe this but it's a critical sentence. Maybe it's big. Maybe it's small.

Here are some example strong starts:

Two parents weep for their teenage child who has gone off to make a name for themselves by exploring Nightstone Cave and never came back.
A bandit with the heads of three village elders from other villages rides into town demanding that the town turn over all of their food and wealth or their own elder's neck will fall under the bandits' knives.
Miners return to town describing a collapsing cave revealing an ancient drow vault.
A carnival has come to town operating out of an ancient amphitheater and villagers have begun to disappear after the performances.
A comet appears in the sky that reveals a mysterious doorway on the nearby mountainside. The locals fear what may step through and ask the characters to investigate it.
A recent rockslide has revealed an ancient dwarven crypt and skeletons have been seen nearby.

We can think of our strong starts under the same lens as the rest of our minimum viable D&D game. What is the minimum a strong start needs to hook the characters?

Discoveries

Combat, interaction, and exploration are the pillars that make up a D&D game and exploration is often about discovery. What are ten things the characters can learn in the next game? This is a core step from Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master called secrets and clues. Here are ten example secrets and clues for that last strong start on the list above.

The dwarves had an ancient burial site in the side of a nearby mountain. Erosion has recently revealed its entrance.
Not all dwarven gods are good. Some were downright sinister.
The uncovered dwarven crypt was in worship of Dumathoin, the god of buried secrets.
The dwarven crypt is full of traps and hazards.
One of the buried dwarven heroes is said to have once held a powerful mace capable of smashing stone.
A band of grave robbers known as the Ghostbloods tried to loot the site. None returned.
A drow necromancer was said to have taken over the site. Since then undead have been seen walking in the dead of night around the area.
The dwarven burial site was maintained for centuries. There are crypts and sepulchers below the main halls.
A monster-infested roaring river flows through the dwarven ruins.
Rumors whisper of a dwarven ghost who still haunts the crypts.

After our strong start, writing out ten secrets and clues gives us the material we need to fill in the story as the characters engage in their adventure.

A Dungeon

Often adventures begin or lead to an interesting location to explore. Many times these adventure locations are dungeons, a core component of D&D. Whenever I need a location, I hit up Dysonlogo's maps and grab the first map that fits what I need. Here's a cool one we can use that should last for a session and fits the secrets we have above:

Pits of the Black Moon by Dysonlogos.com

Locations are more than maps, though. You'll want to list out the interesting features the characters may run into in these locations. In Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master I recommended an evocative name and three features for each location. That may be more than we need for our minimum viable D&D game. An evocative name alone might be enough to fire up your imagination when you need it.

Here are some example location descriptions:

Desecrated Hall of Dwarven Heroes
Slippery Sinkhole
Dark Altar of Myrkul
The Pillars of Dumathoin History
The Crawling Moat
The Smuggler's Cove
The Hall of Roaring Kings
The Sunken Sepulchers

If we're feeling crafty, we can write these names right onto the map so we have a key.

Monsters

A good minimum viable D&D game is all about delving into dungeons and fighting monsters. Often, when we want to put a game together, we can start with the Monster Manual, find a monster we like, read about it's lair, and build our minimum viable adventure around that. The Monster Manual is a great place to start to get inspired for any adventure.

Here are some fun monsters around which you can build a fun adventure:

Hibernating ankhegs
Burrowing azers
A hunting Behir
Ravenous bugbears
The solitary cyclops
Expanding ettercaps
A helpful hag
The sequestered medusa
A disguised lamia
Terrorizing troglodytes

For our map above, we'll go with decrepit skeletons, murderous bandits, devouring carrion crawlers, and a raving specter. We can also drop in a sinister drow necromancer by reskinning a cult fanatic.

NPCs

Fighting monsters isn't the only fun to be had in D&D. In fact, many players prefer NPC interaction to combat or exploration. We should always drop in an NPC or two into our adventures so the characters have people to interact with. When in doubt, use Donjon's random NPC generator to pull up some NPCs and jot them down in your notes.

Here are some interesting NPCs I generated using the Donjon NPC generator:

Harrey Gysby. Male Human Peasant. Harrey is fair in appearance, with short silver hair and narrow blue eyes. He wears sturdy clothing and a wide-brimmed hat. Harrey has red fox named Brose.
Almar. Male Dwarf Monk, LG. Almar has a round face, with red hair and green eyes. He wears simple clothing and wields a bo (quarterstaff) and sai (dagger). Almar is loyal and gentle.
Ancin. Male Half-elf Cleric, LN. Ancin has gray hair and blue eyes, and a straight moustache. He wears studded leather and wields a light hammer and sickle. Ancin seeks to save his family from financial ruin.
Galaser. Female Elf Rogue, LN. Galaser has a round face, with messy auburn hair and gray eyes. She wears studded leather and wields a shortsword and darts. Galaser suffers an acute fear of death.
George Pycey. Male Human Fighter, LE. George has golden hair and hazel eyes. He wears hide armor and wields a war pick and hand crossbow. George has an animal companion, a badger named Rende.

For our dwarven crypt adventure we'll go with the dwarven ghost Almar, a former dwarven monk who protects the crypt and hates the defilement of the drow necromancer.

Treasure

Much of the fun in D&D comes from the tangible rewards for adventure. For our minimum viable D&D game, a quick roll for some random treasure may be enough. Donjon.bin.sh has us covered again with an excellent random treasure generator built from the tables in the Dungeon Master's Guide. Run it a few times until you find a treasure hoard that excites you and paste that into your notes.

Here's a suitable hoard for our dwarven crypt adventure:

2100 cp, 1500 sp, 50 gp, Bolt of Fine Cloth (25 gp), Feathered Ribbon (25 gp), Pewter Hairpin (25 gp), Ceramic Urn (25 gp), Polished Stone Coffer (25 gp), Feathered Shoes (25 gp), Slippers of Spider Climbing (uncommon, dmg 200), +1 Weapon (shortbow) (uncommon, dmg 213)

The Minimum Outline

Our minimum viable outline comes very close to the eight steps fro Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master, only omitting the steps "review the characters" and "outline scenes". Those two steps also have something to offer for our game and don't take a lot of extra time. It turns out the eight steps from Return are pretty close to our minimum viable D&D game already.

When you think of your own D&D games, what are the steps you find most vital? What's the minimum you need to run your own game? For the thought experiment in this article, I've come to the following:

Develop a strong starting scene.
Write out ten secrets and clues the characters may discover.
Grab a map and jot down ten to twelve evocative location names.
Pick some monsters to inhabit our location.
Drop in one or more NPCs the characters can talk to.
Add some interesting treasure.

That's often enough to get a game going. The rest will play itself out as the players get involved and the story starts running free at the table.

New to Sly Flourish? Start here, subscribe to the weekly newsletter, or support Sly Flourish on Patreon!

Check out Mike's books including Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master, the Lazy DM's Workbook, Fantastic Adventures, and Fantastic Adventures: Ruins of the Grendleroot.

Support Sly Flourish by using these links to purchase the D&D Essentials Kit, Players Handbook, Monster Manual, Dungeon Master's Guide, or dice from Easy Roller Dice.

Send feedback to @slyflourish on Twitter or email mike@mikeshea.net.

This article is copyright 2020 by Mike Shea of Sly Flourish.

Running Wars, Big Battles, and Massive Combat in D&D

D&D is designed to cover the stories of a small party of characters adventuring in a land of high fantasy. Sometimes the story of these characters goes into areas not covered well by the rules in the core books.

Here at Sly Flourish I try to offer guidelines to help run this wider range of stories and situations that can come up in our D&D games.

How can we run hordes of monsters in a battle without it getting bogged down? How can I quickly see if a battle may be deadly for the characters? How can we run combat without using a battle map and tokens? It's these sorts of questions I want to answer. I want these guidelines to be quick, easy, and to stay out of the way of the story that evolves at the table.

One of these common situational questions is "how do I run a big war in D&D?".

Today I'll offer guidelines for running big battles as background set pieces in D&D.

Often our DM instincts lead us to build complex new mechanics and systems for atypical situations like running a war in D&D. Just as we have mechanics to handle small-party combat, we figure it seems likely we can build another such system for massive combat. Back in 2017, Wizards put out an Unearthed Arcana playtest document for massive combat but it never made its way into a sourcebook. Instead, early in 2020, Wizards of the Coast published the following in the Explorer's Guide to Wildemount:

Since D&D is primarily a game about a small group of characters going on adventures alone, it can be difficult to simulate massive battles using D&D combat rules. Because of this, it's generally best to keep the characters away from mass battles. However, huge conflicts with thousands of combatants are a cornerstone of epic fantasy, and your players might be disappointed if your war campaign doesn't have at least one climactic battle.

To solve this problem, you can break down your mass combat into manageable chunks. Find a significant location that the characters can either defend or conquer with minimal reinforcements, like an overrun citadel. Then, have the major battle proceed in waves that guide the characters from one cinematic encounter to another. You can think of these encounters like rooms in a dungeon; some rooms have multiple doors that the characters can choose from, while others only have a single passage.

This is good advice and my main recommendation for running mass combat in D&D.

Instead of building a bunch of mechanics for running a big battle, keep the spotlight on the characters and their role in th battle. Let them hunt down lieutenants, plant explosives, uncover spies, protect negotiators, and engage in other such activities. Run big battles off screen. Describe larger battles (quickly) and give characters a first-hand view of the battle through the eyes of their characters, from the trenches to the war-room. Find quests and stories that put the characters in the middle of the war but continues to focus on the small party adventures at the core of D&D.

Here's a list of war-based adventure seeds to help inspire you to build your own war-based quests.

Sabotage enemy equipment
Hunt down opposing lieutenants
Assassinate opposing leaders
Protect negotiators
Root out saboteurs
Hunt down assassins
Protect the queen
Smuggle out prisoners
Find an ancient weapon
Steal the enemy's treasury
Deliver a message to the front
Forge an alliance with a questionable ally
Dismantle a capitalizing thieves guild
Capture someone vital to the enemy's war effort
Defend a chokepoint
Steal a ship
Sink a ship
Protect a ship
Rescue hostages
Relocate civilians caught between two armies

You can lay out a handful of such options so the players can pick the ones that sound like fun to them. Maybe they have to go spy on, infiltrate, or sabotage the enemy's stronghold. Maybe they have to sneak away and go on a diplomatic mission to recruit nearby reclusive elves. Maybe they have to defend a small watchtower about to be overrun while the bulk of the force defends a front line. Even in a big war we can still offer up the three pillars of play — combat, roleplaying, or exploration — and let the players choose which sound cool.

Not Everything Needs Mechanics

All DMs are game designers. We all tweak our game to fit our desires and the the drive to have fun at the table. Sometimes we grab on too heavily to the idea that everything needs mechanics; faction mechanics, political mechanics, travel mechanics, vehicle mechanics, and war mechanics.

Not every aspect of our game needs heavy mechanics. Sometimes we can just describe things. When it comes to running big battles in our D&D games, run them off screen and keep the spotlight on the characters and their impact in the larger war.

New to Sly Flourish? Start here, subscribe to the weekly newsletter, or support Sly Flourish on Patreon!

Check out Mike's books including Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master, the Lazy DM's Workbook, Fantastic Adventures, and Fantastic Adventures: Ruins of the Grendleroot.

Support Sly Flourish by using these links to purchase the D&D Essentials Kit, Players Handbook, Monster Manual, Dungeon Master's Guide, or dice from Easy Roller Dice.

Send feedback to @slyflourish on Twitter or email mike@mikeshea.net.

This article is copyright 2020 by Mike Shea of Sly Flourish.

Running Descent into Avernus Chapter 3

Note: this article contains spoilers for Baldur's Gate: Descent into Avernus.

This article is one of a series of articles covering the D&D hardcover campaign adventure Baldur's Gate: Descent into Avernus. These articles include:

Running Descent into Avernus: The Fall of Elturel
Running Chapter 1 of Descent into Avernus
Running Descent into Avernus Chapter 2
Running Descent into Avernus Chapter 3

For other takes on running Descent into Avernus, see the following:

Merric's Musings on Descent into Avernus
Descent into Avernus Alexandrian Remix
Powerscore's Guide to Descent into Avernus
Running Descent into Avernus One-on-One by the D&D Duet
Eventyr's Running Avernus as a Sandbox

If you prefer this article in video form, take a look at my Running Avernus Chapter 3 Youtube Video.

Chapter 3 of Descent into Avernus is the big meat of this adventure and also takes the most work to wrangle into a great Avernus campaign. Lke the crawl through Chult in Tomb of Annihilation and the exploration of the Sword Coast in Storm King's Thunder, chapter 3 is what makes Descent into Avernus what my wife and I like to call a "yam-shaped adventure": narrow in the beginning and narrow at the end but wide in the middle.

Chapter 3 contains about 25 locations the characters might explore while traveling across the hellscape. As written, chapter 3 begins with the adventurers meeting Mad Maggie at Fort Knucklebone and then follows two potential paths towards the end of the adventure: the Path of Demons and the Path of Devils. This makes chapter 3 less flexible than the big exploration chapters in other published adventures. Some DMs, like Justin Alexander with his Avernus Alexandrian Remix, have worked to turn it into more of a pointcrawl exploration. In my own game, I've added a third path, one with some meaningful choices in it: the Path of the Hellriders. More on this in a minute.

Theme of Descent into Avernus

As mentioned in previous articles on Descent into Avernus, my number one recommendation for this adventure is to tie the characters to Elturel, Reya Mantlemourn, and the Hellriders. In the beginning of the adventure, let them witness the fall of Elturel and ensuring their characters care about its return to Toril. Without this, the characters can lose their motivation for much of the adventure. Why go into hell to save a city you don't really care about?

This shift in theme away from the one in the adventure — the brooding conscripted hunters of cultists in Baldur's Gate — can result in big changes to the adventure in chapter 3. With this change in theme, the characters may not want to follow the paths laid out in the book. It's up to you to make new ones.

The Morality of Soul Coins

This thematic shift becomes clear when the characters received soul coins and realize they'd have to burn soul coins to power their infernal war machine. Think about what it means to destroy a soul permanently. It's way worse than murdering someone. Even if the soul is evil, destroying it forever is not a good act. Souls in D&D have a path they take, good or bad, and pulling one out of that path and destroying them forever is perhaps the worst act a mortal can commit. And we're doing it to move a car a few miles down the road.

In my Youtube video on Soul Coins I recommend an alternative approach to fuel war machines — demon ichor or demon essence. Demons have no souls. They're not reincarnated mortal beings like devils are. They're manifestations of chaos from the primordial sludge of the abyss. Turning them into fuel has no moral complications.

Now perhaps you and your group enjoys the moral complications of soul coins. If so, go with the Gods. If, however, your players want to continue with the theme of light in darkness and good versus evil, you can give them another option for driving around those cool war machines other than the permanent destruction of a mortal soul. Let them run on demon ichor.

All Roads Lead to the Bleeding Citadel

As big as it is, chapter 3 of Descent into Avernus has one main path running through it. Chapter 3 takes the characters from Elturel to the Bleeding Citadel. How they get there and what steps they need to take are up to you and eventually up to them. The book lays out a bunch of locations and two main paths, the Path of Demons and the Path of Devils, but you're free to break away from these paths and choose your own, as I did.

To do so, read through all of the locations in chapter 3 and make a list of locations that sound cool to you; places you're excited to run. Then tie the story and threads together between these locations to connect them from Elturel to the Bleeding Citadel.

You can also fill in your path with an interesting random Averus monuments or extend the whole area with Abyssal Incursion and Encounters in Avernus written by some of the original writers of Descent into Avernus.

Fort Knucklebone

Fort Knucklebone, the first stop in chapter 3, works well as written. Mad Maggie is a fun character and the jobs she puts the characters through can be a good time. Watch some Mad Max Fury Road for inspiration here. The war boys are a great model for the redcaps and madcaps surrounding Mad Maggie.

Near the end of this part of the chapter is when we lay out the first steps in the characters' quest to recover the Sword of Zariel and save Elturel. You decide what they learn from Lulu's dream and which paths become available for them to follow as they hunt down the Sword of Zariel in the Bleeding Citadel.

Path of the Hellriders

For my own running of Descent into Avernus I stepped away from the Path of Demons and the Path of Devils and created a new path: the Path of the Hellriders. This path reinforced the initial themes of the adventure I laid out with Fall of Elturel. Because the characters had such a strong connection to Elturel and the Hellriders, keeping the story focused on the Hellriders helped tie the rest of the adventure together.

The Path of the Hellriders follows Zariel's generals. I rewrote some of the history of these generals to fit the theme I sought. These generals include:

Jandar Sunspire. One of the original Hellrider generals, Jandar did not submit to Zariel when she turned. He is the only being who knows the location of the Bleeding Citadel where Yael hid Zariel's sword. Gideon Lightward turned Jandar into a vampire and impaled him on a silver-spired tree on Harumon's Hill to find the location of the Sword of Zariel.
Harumon. Zariel's most loyal general who followed her into Avernus and stayed by her side when she bent the knee to Asmodeus. Harumon seeks the sword of Zariel and knows Jandar knows where it is, thus keeping him pinned up at Harumon's Hill.
Gideon Lightward. One of Zariel's generals who charged into Avernus and returned to Elturel a vampire. The Companion protected him from Toril's sun. Now that Elturel has fallen into Avernus, Gideon acts as Zariel's spymaster. I'm not sure where he'll show up in my own campaign but he's a fun variable to have around.
Olanthius. A fallen general of Zariel, Olanthius became a death knight but hates his new existence and seeks to redeem Zariel. His journals in the Crypt of the Hellriders exposes his true feelings and makes him a strong possible ally for the characters.
Yael. A general of Zariel who took Zariel's sword from her before Zariel bent the knee to Asmodeus. Yael buried the blade in the fleshy earth that soon became the Bleeding Citadel. Only Jandar knows its location.

The following outlines the clues the characters follow along the path of the Hellriders.

Yael the Hellrider general who broke away from Zariel after Zariel made her pact with Asmodeus took Zariel's sword deep into Avernus and stabbed it into the ground forming the Bleeding Citadel.
Only Jandar Sunspire knows the location of the Bleeding Citadel. He was turned into a vampire and impaled upon a silver tree at Harumon's Hill by those generals still loyal to Zariel in hopes he would tell them the location of the Bleeding Citadel.
Only the remaining Hellriders know where Jandar is held. These other Hellrider generals include Harumon, Olanthius, and Gideon Lightward. Harumon rides in service of Zariel. Gideon serves as Zariel's spymaster now that he has led Elturel into hell. Olanthius resides at the Crypt of the Hellriders.
Olanthius hates what he has become and with some careful negotiation can tell the characters that Jandar is held at Harumon's Hill and can give them directions there.
Atop Harumon's Hill the characters can save or destroy Jandar and learn the location of the Bleeding Citadel just before Harumon attacks them in order to learn the location himself.
At this point the characters make their way to the Bleeding Citadel in chapter 4.

Releasing Tiamat

As the characters follow this path they may be drawn towards other alternatives as well. Krull, Arkhan's speaker, may tell the characters that Arkhan the Cruel wishes to talk to them. Arkhan offers to save Elturel if they recover a particular puzzlebox he cannot find. An ancient sibriex knows the location of the puzzlebox (choose a location for the characters to locate the puzzlebox) and the characters can recover it. Giving the puzzlebox to Arkhan lets him release Tiamat, trapped after her loss in Rise of Tiamat, back into Avernus at which point all hell breaks loose (pun intended). Tiamat, true to her word, breathes and destroy the chains binding Elturel, releasing it back into Toril.

Gargauth

Gargauth, the archdevil trapped in the Shield of the Hidden Lord, can play another important part in this adventure. Throughout their journeys the shield may influence the characters to seek Gargauth's release. Perhaps only two things could do this. First, it could be melted in Bel's Forge. If the characters traveled to that location for any given reason, the shield may either try to convince the character wielding the shield to throw it into Bel's molten fires or attempt to overtake the character and force them to. With Gargauth's release, more chaos ensues. Bel, subservient to Gargauth, would likely kneel to the being and join together to overthrow Zariel. The Sword of Zariel can also break the shield. Gargauth seeks an opportunity to force the wielder of the sword to smash against the shield, thus releasing the archdevil as well.

Filling Out the Crypt of the Hellriders

Unfortunately, one of the locations that works best for the path of the Hellrider, is also one of the most disappointing. The writeup for the Crypt of the Hellriders has fifteen keyed locations and only seven descriptions; offering repeated descriptions for many of the chambers. You'll want to fill out these rooms with your own details as the characters explore them. Here are a few suggested features of these otherwise empty or repeated room:

A former Hellrider general turned into a mummy lord and trapped in an iron sarcophagus.
The remains of an ancient gateway showing glimmers of Zariel's home plane.
A sinister black obelisk dripping blood into a pool on the floor.
A pit of charred ashes swirl together into specters.
A burning violet flame in a brazier speaking dark secrets.
A large ornate mirror showing Zariel's ship cutting across the Avernus skies.
A table with a large chess set. The black pieces move in response to the white pieces, moved by a remote player (Bel? Gideon Lightward? The Sibriex?)
A slashed painting of Zariel's ride into hell showing each of her generals.
A deep well leading down into the underground waterways of Styx.
One of Gideon Lightward's two sarcophagi.
A holy well hidden behind a cracked wall.
The sarcophagi of a half-dozen vampire spawn loyal to Gideon Lightward.

The Wandering Emporium

Adventuring in Avernus is almost all downward beats. It can be depressing, not just to the characters but to the players as well. How many festering blood-filled bogs, tasteless meals, and nightmare filled rests can the characters take? The Wandering Emporium offers an excellent opportunity to bring in an upward beat — a place protected from the horrors of Avernus where the characters can rest, recover, shop, and pick up rumors.

By this point, however, the characters may not trust it. So broken have they become by the horrors of Avernus that they won't trust a shining light in the darkness even when it does show up. They may want nothing to do with it. When Mahati drops a contract on them to eat and rest at the Infernal Rapture, they may decide not to sign it, ending their opportunity. Players hate contracts. They don't trust them, even when they're simple. Surely they're getting screwed.

If they choose to pass on the Emporium, be ready to drop another upward beat in the story for them. Remember, Avernus used to be a beautiful place filled with temptations. Some of these ruined places of beauty still exist; perhaps a ruined elven pavilion with a fountain of healing and respite beckon to them.

Traveling from Place to Place

As described, traveling through Avernus isn't like traveling through any real world. The world changes and shifts, elongates and contracts. For the characters to travel from place to place, they need some sort of guide — often a magical guide. Here are a few potential ways the characters can find direction in Avernus as they travel from place to place.

A leathery tattooed finger points then way when dangled from a string, perhaps when hanging from the rear view mirror of an infernal war machine.
A constellation of stars points the way while the rest of the stars shift and move.
Strange lines in rocks and sand seem to all point in one direction for those who can see it.
A huge stirge (a fiendish roc) flies in the sky towards the location the characters seek.
A hammer banged into the cracked earth causes cracks to form in a line towards their location.
A line of corpses, each with an ancient ring on one finger, points the way to one another, eventually ending at the destination.

Building Your Own Adventure

As written, Descent into Avernus is a bit of a mess. While some may read it and find it to be a fun adventure focused on descending into darkness, others, myself included, find the theme and structure difficult to manage. Instead of looking at Descent into Avernus as a cohesive adventure, it works best to think of the adventure as a loose outline around a central theme and a toolbox of NPCs, locations, and encounters you can tie together into an adventure all your own.

New to Sly Flourish? Start here, subscribe to the weekly newsletter, or support Sly Flourish on Patreon!

Check out Mike's books including Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master, the Lazy DM's Workbook, Fantastic Adventures, and Fantastic Adventures: Ruins of the Grendleroot.

Support Sly Flourish by using these links to purchase the D&D Essentials Kit, Players Handbook, Monster Manual, Dungeon Master's Guide, or dice from Easy Roller Dice.

Send feedback to @slyflourish on Twitter or email mike@mikeshea.net.

This article is copyright 2020 by Mike Shea of Sly Flourish.

Owlbear Rodeo: A Simple D&D Virtual Tabletop

If you're seeking a lightweight virtual tabletop, try out Owlbear Rodeo. It's awesome.

Covid-19 forced many DMs to move games from in-person to online. For a lot of us, running games online is an entirely new experience. I moved all of my games, about three a week, online and lept into trying out all sorts of systems for online play. My favorite, and the one I've been using for eight months now, is to run D&D over Discord. By copying and pasting pieces of maps, usually grabbed from Dysonlogos, I can show the players where the characters are without using a full virtual tabletop like Roll 20. For combat, I use text-based combat tracker for rough zone-based combat more similar to theater of the mind than gridded combat.

There are times, however, where dropping down a map with tokens for monsters and characters can be useful. Many players and quite a few DMs prefer this style of play.

The big dogs among virtual tabletop tools are Roll 20 and Fantasty Grounds. There are other popular and well-loved tools as well like Foundry but these two typically come up when someone talks about virtual tabletops.

These other VTTs are fine all-in-one systems that integrate D&D's rules with the rest of the tabletop.

The problem is, I'm fine with running games mostly on Discord. I don't need a fully integrated D&D experience in my VTT. My players like using D&D Beyond and I'm not picky about how they roll dice, whether it's with Avrae in Discord or a plug-in like Beyond20.

Unleash the Owlbear Rodeo

When I want a VTT, I really just want a map and tokens. That's what Owlbear Rodeo provides. Owlbear Rodeo is a slimmed down virtual tabletop that focuses on maps and tokens. It has no integrated ruleset, although it does have a shared dice roller in it if you want one. Owlbear Rodeo makes it easy to drop in a map and includes a bunch of default tokens you can use if you don't feel like adding your own.

If you do want your own tokens, you can upload a bunch of them right into Owlbear Rodeo all at once, whether your tokens are from Printable Heroes (my personal favorite tokens; search for "vtt") or your own hand-made tokens using Token Stamp. Grabbing an image off the net, dropping it into Token Stamp, and uploading it to Owlbear is fast and easy.

Owlbear Rodeo requires no login or account from either you or your players. You can log in if you want to keep track of your previous maps and tokens, but it isn't necessary. Owlbear uses some sort of cookie to keep track so if you come back it will likely remember what you already uploaded but only if you're coming in from the same machine. Not requiring a login makes it easy for players to jump right in. No accounts means any player can move any token around since everyone's permissions are the same. I'm assuming your players aren't a bunch of 4 year olds (that's a big assumption, of course).

Owlbear Rodeo has two features that aren't the easiest to figure out at first: grid alignment when bringing in a map and using the fog of war. This three minute video by GoGoCamel camel shows how to use both the grid-alignment feature and fog of war. It's well worth the watch.

If you're used to a more full-featured VTT like Roll 20, you're likely to find features missing from Owlbear that you really want. If you dig more powerhouse tools, it probably isn't for you. I prefer to keep my D&D games as minimal as possible. I want tools that only do what I need them to do and keep the cruft out of the way. Owlbear Rodeo does just that. I can run the rest of my game in Discord and only drop into Owlbear when I need to use a VTT. When I'm done, we drop right back out again.

At this point I've used Owlbear Rodeo with dozens of players and have heard no complaints. Many have described it being the exact kind of VTT they want. If you're in need of a lightweight virtual tabletop, give Owlbear Rodeo a try.

New to Sly Flourish? Start here, subscribe to the weekly newsletter, or support Sly Flourish on Patreon!

Check out Mike's books including Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master, the Lazy DM's Workbook, Fantastic Adventures, and Fantastic Adventures: Ruins of the Grendleroot.

Support Sly Flourish by using these links to purchase the D&D Essentials Kit, Players Handbook, Monster Manual, Dungeon Master's Guide, or dice from Easy Roller Dice.

Send feedback to @slyflourish on Twitter or email mike@mikeshea.net.

This article is copyright 2020 by Mike Shea of Sly Flourish.

Paths for DM Expertise

John B., a Sly Flourish patron, sent me a note describing an awesome video series by Wired on levels of complexity. Two of them really grabbed my attention, the levels of complexity of origami and Tony Hawk's levels of complexity of skateboarding. Tony Hawk's video begins with the basic ollie and ends with two moves having never been done at the time of the video. It's fascinating to see how the levels of complexity get exponentially harder the further along the rank you go.

D&D complexity, however, doesn't always make our games better. I'd argue Matt Mercer's Vecnca Ascended; the finale of the 114 previous episodes of Vox Machina, is about as complicated and amazing as any D&D campaign we're likely to see. It isn't, however, a realistic model of the vast majority of D&D games. Like pulling off a 1260 on a skateboard, games like this are nearly unattainable. And that's ok because complexity doesn't make great games.

I'm fascinated to look at D&D through the lens of escalating complexity but it isn't exactly practical. We may have run incredibly complex campaigns from 1st to 20th level, with detailed character story arcs, amazing tabletop dioramas, beautiful handouts, and cool props; but they're not necessarily the model of all great D&D games. A great D&D game might be a one-shot drawn from the inspiration of the DM at the spur of the moment. It might be run totally in the theater of the mind. Sometimes the best games are the simplest games: four adventurers crawling through a dangerous dungeon seeking a valued treasure.

Though simplicity may be a virtue in great D&D games, that doesn't mean we DM's can't get better at DMing. What are the paths we DMs can take to get better at running D&D games? What would it look like as a curriculum?

Instead of breaking D&D games down into levels of complexity, I'll describe potential paths for getting better at DMing D&D games. These are often parallel tracks, not a single path. There are likely as many paths for DM proficiency as there are DMs but I'm going to offer my own suggestions here.

Along with the videos on complexity in origami and skateboarding, this article was also heavily influenced by Mark Hulmes's Youtube video on Becoming a Better DM. Check it out.

The Beginner's Path: Running the D&D Starter Set or Essentials Kit

One can do far worse than to start running D&D games with either the D&D Essentials Kit or the D&D Starter Set. A set of pregen character sheets from the Starter Set is a great way to get new players on board with D&D. Other than making your way through the rules and through the adventure, I wouldn't expect a new DM to do much else. We're not necessarily going to have deep character background integration, detailed story threads, or amazing tabletop displays. This is just plain and simple D&D and it can still be an awesome time.

In reading tons of posts on Reddit's D&D Next, and the DM Academy subreddits and clearly many new DMs choose to go the homebrew route. I don't recommend it for new DMs but likely others disagree and I doubt I'll be listened to by those who want to anyway. I do, however, recommend keeping things simple. Avoid house rules until you know the system. Choose straight forward character options. Start at 1st level characters and be nice. That said, I still recommend starting with the Starter Set or Essentials Kit.

Recommended reading: Getting Started with D&D, D&D Starter Set, D&D Essentials Kit.

Running Your First Short Campaign

With a few games under one's belt, the next level of experience occurs as a DM runs their first campaign up to about 5th level. Here I'd expect the DM to begin to customize the adventure to fit the backgrounds of the characters. Maybe the guy running the inn is the cousin of the dwarven cleric. DMs here should likely begin improvising some scenes as they come up, including building NPCs on the spot when the moment calls for it. DMs here can hopefully start developing situations instead of building scenes already planned out. The complexity of characters below 5th level are easier to handle than higher level games as well. Games at this level are still often awesome games.

Beyond this is when the complexity of DMing goes up and the paths to becoming a better DM split into parallel tracks. Each of these parallel tracks shores up different areas for being a well-rounded DM.

Becoming the Characters' Biggest Fan

Once we get beyond the basics, it's time for a DM to look at the people around the table and the characters they bring to it. We can deeply internalize a concept from Dungeon World to become the characters' biggest fan. Here we put aside any idea that we're competing with the players in a game. We put aside our own drive to force a story down one particular path. We play to see what happens. We put the characters first and foremost in the spotlight. We make reviewing the characters the first step in our game prep. We run session zeros to calibrate everyone's expectations of a campaign.

We serve the fun of the game first and foremost. Our goal is for everyone, including ourselves, to have a great time.

Recommended reading: Dungeon World.

Run Lots of Games, Run Lots of Systems

We get better at DMing by DMing more games. We also get better by playing more games, with as many other DMs as we can, good or bad, so we can see how it's done. Playing and running other roleplaying game systems also helps us become better DMs. There are lots of ways to run RPGs and lots of systems to help you do so. These systems often have great ideas we can bring back into our D&D games. Running games for a wide range of players also teaches us a lot. Convention games and organized play programs offer great opportunities to run games for many players.

Recommended reading: Numenera, Fate Condensed, Blades in the Dark, 13th Age, Shadow of the Demon Lord.

Flexibility, Adaptability, Improvisation

As the most valued DM traits; we can follow a lifelong path for improving our flexibility, adaptability, and improvisation skills. We can work harder at thinking on our feet, building scenes as they occur during the game instead of planning them ahead of time. We let go of fixed scenes and predetermined stories and build situations. We can learn how to improvise NPCs. We can seek out the tools that help us best improvise during the game. Learning how to stay flexible, go where the story goes, and steer it delicately towards the fun is an advanced DM trait that leads to more enjoyable games for both DMs and players alike.

Understanding Pacing

According to RPG veteran Monte Cook, there is no more important skill for a DM to learn than pacing. Robin Laws teaches us that understanding how upward and downward beats feel during the game and knowing how to shift them one way or the other to avoid apathy or despair is an advanced and critical skill for running great games. Like a curling player, our job is to smooth out the path in front of the story, not grab control of it. Recognize and take hold of the dials you have available to change up an encounter, a scene, or a whole adventure to fit the feeling and theme of the adventure's pacing as it plays out.

Recommended reading: Hamlet's Hit Points.

Maps, Props, Terrain, and Handouts

Physical stuff increases the immersion of a game. When players have things they can see, touch, and hold that ties them to the world, that world becomes ever more real. While not necessary to run a great game, tabletop accessories, when used well, can make a great game better. Some of these things can be made at home for almost nothing. Others can cost hundreds to thousands of dollars. These exponential costs often result in linear gains, however. Before spending a lot of money, consider that there are often ways to make our games better that cost nothing at all.

Rules Proficiency, Not Rules Mastery

One might think that a better understanding of the rules is critical to run a great D&D game. Certainly being proficient enough with the rules to run the game is important but, according to tens of thousands of surveys conducted by Baldman Games for their organized play program, rules mastery, as one of four tracked attributes, has the least correlation to a fun game. Instead, being friendly and being prepared have a far greater correlation with running a fun game. DMs should have enough of an understanding of the rules to keep the game running smoothly. Rules mastery, however, isn't required. Instead, focus attention on the other areas that have a higher impact described above.

Recommended Reading: Player's Handbook, Dungeon Master's Guide, Monster Manual.

Learning from Other DMs

The internet has given us unparalleled access to other DMs. We have unlimited sources to run our ideas by other DMs, see what ideas they have, and get differing points of view. I argue that the D&D-focused subreddits on Reddit offer some of the best access to DMs of all experience levels. Look at the questions those DMs are asking and learn from the answers they receive. Further, if you happen to be running a published campaign book, there's almost always a subreddit focused on it with advice, tips, tricks, and accessories to help your own campaign run well.

Recommended reading: DM Academy, D&D Next, DM Behind the Screen, numerous campaign subreddits.

A Lifelong Pursuit

Being an expert DM is a lifelong pursuit. Never have we had more access to more knowledge about being a great DM. We have access to videos of more D&D games than we could ever watch. With a few clicks we have access to the knowledge of thousands of other DMs. Spend time figuring out what makes a great D&D game for you, build your own path, and keep running D&D games.

New to Sly Flourish? Start here, subscribe to the weekly newsletter, or support Sly Flourish on Patreon!

Check out Mike's books including Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master, the Lazy DM's Workbook, Fantastic Adventures, and Fantastic Adventures: Ruins of the Grendleroot.

Support Sly Flourish by using these links to purchase the D&D Essentials Kit, Players Handbook, Monster Manual, Dungeon Master's Guide, or dice from Easy Roller Dice.

Send feedback to @slyflourish on Twitter or email mike@mikeshea.net.

This article is copyright 2020 by Mike Shea of Sly Flourish.

Building Lazy Dungeons

The eight steps from Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master mentions little about maps. The expectation is that the "develop fantastic locations" step covers locations big and small and stick-figure diagrams are enough to connect locations together.

Recently, though, I've been using actual location maps — mostly dungeon maps — in my prep and found a nice lazy way to fill these maps out.

Behold Dyson Logos

There are lots of sources for great maps out there but my current favorite is Dysonlogos. Dyson offers nearly a thousand maps on his site for free, many of them usable in commercial works if you're so inclined. Visit the site, grab a map that fits the location you're thinking of, and you're off to the races. For lazy map making, think in general terms about the location you need and grab the first map that fits the idea. Need a crypt? Grab the first crypt you find. The less picky you are, the easier it is to find a map that works.

Annotate Locations

Next, as part of "developing fantastic locations", annotate the map with evocative names that fuel our minds when the characters reach the room. This way we don't waste time on rooms the characters don't visit and yet still have enough detail to improvise the room if the characters do go there.

Annotate the map with whatever image editor is easies to use. On my Mac, I use Preview to add text labels with white backgrounds to the map so it's easy to read against the map's background. Here's an example map from my Eberron game.

Microsoft Paint works equally well. More advanced image editors can also do the trick but you don't need anything too fancy. It should be fast and easy. We're not making publication-level work here. Friends of mine like dropping the map into Roll 20 and annotating it right in the virtual tabletop. Anything can work as long as it's fast and easy.

Define Ten Locations

Sometimes we'll want to annotate every room in a dungeon if it isn't too much trouble. Other times, though, it isn't so clear how many places we need to label. A city for example, may need a bunch of locations to feel real and alive. In this case, I recommend defining ten locations. Ten seems like a lot, and it may be more than you actually need, but defining ten locations pushes our brains into interesting and creative directions. Here's an example of a city map for the city of Eston in which I defined ten locations the characters could explore:

Dropping evocative names on a map like this gives us ideas should the characters visit a location. For larger locations we might use additional maps to further break down these larger places. Otherwise, if the characters never bother to explore them, we need nothing more than a couple of words.

Use Evocative Labels

When you're considering your labels, make them unique and interesting. Inspire yourself with your descriptions — even of they're only two words long. "Lighting Rail Station" isn't very interesting but "Wild Lighting Rail Station" sounds cooler. We have an idea what might be going on there. "Radiant Sinkhole" is more interesting than a straight sinkhole. Here's a list of ten example evocative labels for the inner cars of Karshak, the rogue warforged lighting rail in my Eberron game modeled after Blane the Mono in Stephen King's Wastelands:

Manifest Portal Engine
Karshak's Artificer Brain
Warforged Guardian Car
Automated Dining Car
Transparent 1st Class Cabin
Gas-induced Sleeping Cabin
Cryofreeze Cabin
Dragonshard Storage Car
Automaton Construction Car
War Caboose

These aren't perfect examples but hopefully it gives you the idea. The main thing is that the labels mean something to you. You're not writing these for anyone else.

Need some inspiration? Try out the random monument generator or this Eberron location generator to get some ideas for interesting location labels.

Home Use Versus Publication

When we're preparing stuff like this for our home game, remember that we're only doing this for ourselves. We don't need to meet the high standards required for publishing adventures. We only need a few words to spark our own imagination, not pass this along to others. Fast and dirty is perfectly acceptable for our own prep. Leave it rough, no one will care what it looks like. The game is your painting, your maps and prep notes are your messy palette and brush rag. Don't worry if they're rough.

New to Sly Flourish? Start here, subscribe to the weekly newsletter, or support Sly Flourish on Patreon!

Check out Mike's books including Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master, the Lazy DM's Workbook, Fantastic Adventures, and Fantastic Adventures: Ruins of the Grendleroot.

Support Sly Flourish by using these links to purchase the D&D Essentials Kit, Players Handbook, Monster Manual, Dungeon Master's Guide, or dice from Easy Roller Dice.

Send feedback to @slyflourish on Twitter or email mike@mikeshea.net.

This article is copyright 2020 by Mike Shea of Sly Flourish.

Building a Great D&D Character

Here at Sly Flourish I focus on advice for D&D dungeon masters. Today I'm breaking away and offer some advice for players. This is, however, advice for player from the perspective of a dungeon master. You're not going to find optimal feats for any given build. Instead, I offer thoughts that might make the game more fun for you, for your DM, and for the rest of the group.

Here's a quick summary and checklist to consider when building your character:

Build your character around the theme of the adventure or campaign.
Build a character that fits in well with the group both from a story and mechanics standpoint.
Use the Xanathar chapter "this is your life" to generate a fun background.
Keep your backstory to a few lines instead of dozens of pages.
Build your character's background over time.
Choose mechanics that synergize with the group.
Hold back on mechanics that frustrate the DM.

Build Around the Theme of the Campaign

Everyone's going to have more fun if you understand the theme of the campaign before you build your character. Just as DMs can review the characters first while preparing their D&D games, the players can digest the theme of the adventure and campaign before building their characters; both in story and in mechanics.

Many players dive right into character creation without considering the story or the theme of the campaign. They get excited about a particular class or a race and class combination and run with it. They plan out a bunch of levels ahead of time and never consider whether the themes of that character fit well with the themes of the campaign. This leads to ham-fisted attempts to draw the character into the story and into the adventuring group.

If your DM hasn't told you about the adventure or campaign yet, ask them. Ask them what themes will come up. Ask them what skills will be most relevant. Suggest they run a session zero if they're not already planning one and don't build your character fully until you're in that session zero.

Once you have a handle on the theme of the campaign, spread that information around. Talk to the other players. Ask them how they plan to build their characters around the theme of the campaign as well. Help the DM steer the other players towards building characters that fit well with the story.

Build For the Group

Once you have a good idea what the themes of the campaign are and start to build your character around it, consider how you can build a character that fits in well with the group from both a story and mechanics standpoint. Ask yourself this key question to help integrate your character into the group:

Why does my character want to travel with others while going on these adventures?

Often players come up with backstories that seem antithetical to the story of the campaign and traveling with a group. Nobility that would rather spend time alone with a good book in a royal palace often doesn't enjoy traveling through dungeons with a group of smelly adventurers. This doesn't mean you can't have a character where adventure is foreign or even undesired but they must still have the motivation to adventure with others. The character doesn't have to like adventuring with others but they should be motivated to do so anyway.

The same is true for the mechanics you choose. DM David wrote a wonderful article about choosing character abilities that work well with other characters. It's an eye-opening idea. Choose classes and abilities that support the other characters and you'll build a much stronger bond with the characters and players when you use them. When you have a choice for new spells or abilities, ask yourself which abilities help other characters and choose those as often as you dare. Building huge high-damage characters is fun but so is helping other characters do their thing best. Consider how your character's mechanics can directly benefit the group.

Build a Digestible Backstory

Our characters are the heroes of the story in our eyes. As players, our own character is the hero of our journey and we don't often put other players' characters in the same spotlight. We are, most of the time, one fifth of the group but our own character feels more important than that.

When developing the backstory for your character, keep that one-fifth spotlight in mind. Keep your backstory brief. Describe it in one to five sentences instead of one to five pages.

You don't need to build out your character's backstories all at once. As a player, I don't start filling out my backstory until I've played at least one adventure and reached 2nd level. Then I'll spend the time to start filling in the details.

Until we start seeing our character going on adventures with the rest of the group, we don't really know that character. Our idea for their background may change. Like the DM who lets the story of the campaign evolve from session to session, we can let our character's backstory evolve as we begin to know who they are. Think of it like carving a statue. It starts as an undefined block and slowly, as we play them at the game, they begin to take better definition.

Xanathar's Guide to Everything has an awesome way to generate your character's background in the section called "This Is Your Life". You might have two older sisters and a younger brother. You might have an old childhood friend who you hurt through a mistake and still regret it. Lots of interesting backgrounds come from these tables, backgrounds we're unlikely to have thought of ourself. When you have one, share your background with your DM and the other players, keeping in mind to keep it brief.

Be Nice to Your DM

Our character is at the center of that story but players can remember that the DM is invested in this tale too. Don't build characters intended to circumvent every challenge or "easy mode" their way through the adventure. We all want our characters to be effective but there's such a thing as too effective. Avoid focusing on just one aspect of the character, like focusing on a crazy high armor class, huge damage output, or paralyzing single powerful creatures. Remember that you're DM wants to have fun too and it's just as lame for their boss monster to be stuck in a force cage for a whole battle as it would be for your character.

If your DM lets you choose multi-classing and feats, choose options that fit the story of your character rather than chasing a particular combination of powerful mechanical benefits. D&D is a complicated game and there are ways to break it. Instead of zeroing in on those spiky bits, consider the story of your character and act as they would act in a great action movie.

Be wary of abilities that "break" the game or take the fun away from the DM just as you would hope they do not take the fun away from you.

Building For the Group and the Story

Building a great character isn't about optimizing mechanics or building a unique story that no one has ever heard about. Building a great character means bringing in a character that fits with the group and with the adventure. Do your whole table a service and think about how your character can best serve the other characters and the story overall. Build the character that brings the most fun to the story and the group.

New to Sly Flourish? Start here, subscribe to the weekly newsletter, or support Sly Flourish on Patreon!

Check out Mike's books including Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master, the Lazy DM's Workbook, Fantastic Adventures, and Fantastic Adventures: Ruins of the Grendleroot.

Support Sly Flourish by using these links to purchase the D&D Essentials Kit, Players Handbook, Monster Manual, Dungeon Master's Guide, or dice from Easy Roller Dice.

Send feedback to @slyflourish on Twitter or email mike@mikeshea.net.

This article is copyright 2020 by Mike Shea of Sly Flourish.

D&D Prep: Write Down Ten Things

Everyone has creative habits that work well for them. Today I'm going to share one of mine.

Write down ten things.

Write down ten notable locations in your fantasy city. Write down ten dungeons the characters might discover in their journeys. Write down ten encounters they may run into while traveling through the ruins of Talondek. Write down ten interesting NPCs they might meet. Write down ten monuments that might serve as the backdrop to a scene when the characters explore those old ruins.

Instead of writing long paragraphs of history and lore, jot down ten interesting bits of history the characters may learn.

Seasoned lazy dungeon masters recognize this as the model for Secrets and Clues in Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master. Secrets and Clues are the secret sauce for preparing to improvise. We don't write out long piles of theological lore; we write down ten things the characters may discover in the next game independent of where they might discover them. It's the location of those secrets we improvise during the game.

There's a secret power in writing down ten things. Three things are easy. Six things aren't so bad. We can hit seven things before we start to struggle. Ten requires thinking hard about those last three. We've gotten all of the easy stuff out of our heads and how we have to work. Those final three things are often painful. They're also often the most interesting ones.

Often we can define big parts of our campaign from combinations of these lists. We can build a city, wilderness, or dungeon from a combination of ten important locations, ten notable landmarks, and ten potential wandering encounters. Ten is often more than we need to put in front of the characters. Often three will do. But listing ten and even hinting that we have more makes the players feel like the place is lush and alive and bustling.

Give it a try next time you're stuck in a boring meeting (ugh) or out for a nice walk (much better). Ask yourself to define ten things about your game. Maybe it's ten random encounters (not always violent monsters, by the way). Maybe it's ten landmarks in the region. Maybe it's ten gangs or mercenary companies.

Define your whole world from lists of ten things.

New to Sly Flourish? Start here, subscribe to the weekly newsletter, or support Sly Flourish on Patreon!

Check out Mike's books including Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master, the Lazy DM's Workbook, Fantastic Adventures, and Fantastic Adventures: Ruins of the Grendleroot.

Support Sly Flourish by using these links to purchase the D&D Essentials Kit, Players Handbook, Monster Manual, Dungeon Master's Guide, or dice from Easy Roller Dice.

Send feedback to @slyflourish on Twitter or email mike@mikeshea.net.

This article is copyright 2020 by Mike Shea of Sly Flourish.

Running Ravenloft / Curse of Strahd in a Single Session

Note: This article has been updated since its original version published in November 2012.

Published in 1983, the classic D&D adventure I6 Ravenloft, was ranked in 2004 by Dungeon magazine as the second greatest adventure of all time. Five years before its publication, Tracy and Laura Hickman ran the classic D&D module every Halloween. Ravenloft contains one of the best open-ended randomly determined adventures produced for Dungeons & Dragons and it's perfect for a Halloween one-shot game.

With the release of Curse of Strahd, we have Ravenloft fully updated to the 5th edition D&D. Though intended for a long campaign, we can strip Curse of Strahd down to a single five-hour game for 7th level characters perfect for us to run on or around Halloween every year.

Here's one way to run Curse of Strahd in a single session Halloween-themed adventure.

The Party's Goals

Strip down the goals of Ravenloft to one single goal: Kill Strahd. Expanding this a bit, the characters must hunt down the devil Strahd to save Ireena Kolyana from becoming his dark bride.

To help them kill Strahd, the characters must seek out three powerful artifacts hidden within the castle including the Sun Sword, the Icon of Ravenloft, and the Tome of Strahd.

I've replaced the Holy Symbol of Ravenkind with the Icon of Ravenloft because the Icon's abilities better fit the theme of this game and a paralyzed Strahd isn't much fun. That means the Icon of Ravenloft does not sit on the altar in room K15. Instead, replace it with a large bowl of holy water able to restore the vitality of the party once, giving them the equivalent of a short or long rest depending on how hard a time the characters are having.

We're also going to add a trait to the Tome of Strahd to streamline this single-session run of Ravenloft. When defeated, the characters can burn the Tome of Strahd to destroy Strahd permanently instead of seeking out his coffin. This is likely the only item the characters need to truly defeat Strahd.

Ireena as a Character

In this scenario Ireena accompanies the group into Ravenloft. She isn't putting up with his creepy stalker ways and is taking the fight right to him. You can either let one of the players run Ireena as a veteran along with their main character or you can have one of the characters play Ireena herself as their main character. Ireena is a human but can be of any class the players choose and is the same level as the rest of the party.

Ravenloft Character Bonds

To keep this game simple, every character has the following bond:

By blood or by deed you and your companions are sworn to aid and protect Ireena from the devil Strahd.

With this bond every character has a built-in motivation to group together, go to Ravenloft with Ireena, and destroy the vampire once and for all.

Intro: The Carriage Ride to Ravenloft and the Drawing

When the characters begin the adventure, read or summarize the following:

The ornate black carriage roars along the narrow winding road leading to Castle Ravenloft. Peering out one window, you watch rocks fall one thousand feet to the river below. Ahead the carriage master turns his cowled face towards you, his eyes shrouded under his tattered leather tricorn hat. Reaching back with an arm too long for his body, he gently pushes you back into the carriage and locks the door.

Raspy laughter rattles the glyphed coins of Madame Eva's veil. Sitting across from you, she draws an ancient worn deck of cards from her colored robes and begins placing them face up on the small table inside the carriage.

When using Curse of Strahd for this run of Ravenloft, we'll use the simplified fortune drawing described in James Introcaso's Guide to Running Curse of Strahd as a one-shot adventure with one minor exception: skip the ally and stick to the three artifacts and Strahd's location. Remove all but the following cards from the common cards in the Tarokka deck or a normal deck of cards:

Paladin (2 of Swords/Spades)
Mercenary (4 of Swords/Spades)
Berserker (6 of Swords/Spades)
Dictator (8 of Swords/Spades)
Warrior (Master of Swords/10 of Spades)
Transmuter (1 of Stars/Ace of Clubs)
Evoker (6 of Stars/Clubs)
Necromancer (8 of Stars/Clubs)
Swashbuckler (1 of Coins/Ace of Diamonds)
Merchant (4 of Coins/Diamonds)
Guild Member (5 of Coins/Diamonds)
Miser (9 of Coins/Diamonds)
Shepherd (4 of Glyphs/Hearts)
Anarchist (6 of Glyphs/Hearts)
Priest (Master of Glyphs/10 of Hearts)

Madame Eva places out four cards, three from the common deck (one for each artifact) and one from the high deck which represents Strahd's location. With those cards placed, the adventure is ready to begin.

Strahd's Invitation

The characters arrive at Castle Ravenloft under the invitation of Strahd as described in the book. Instead of an illusion of Strahd playing the grand organ, it is Strahd himself. As they dine, Strahd lays out the rules of his "game" which, in short is the following:

"Defeat me and you save Ireena. Perish and she is mine."

In his unfathomable cruelty he asks Ireena a simple question:

"Give yourself to me now, my love, and you can save their lives."

Ireena looks to the party for guidance. If she appears as though she will give herself to Strahd, he turns to them and asks:

"and you would allow this?".

Should they choose to hand her over, Strahd looks very disappointed.

"They are not worth your affection. Let them rot in this castle and let you walk with them and see the results of their cowardice first hand."

Strahd then departs from the dinner as the room grows cold.

Should the characters decide to confront Strahd there and then, Strahd is accompanied by two vampire spawns and has an additional spawn for every character above four. Strahd himself may battle the characters but leaves the characters to his vampire spawn and departs.

Recover the Three Artifacts Before Facing Strahd

The party must find all three artifacts before facing Strahd. 45 minutes before the end of the game, Strahd attacks the characters wherever they are and with whatever artifacts they have received. If the party does not have the Tome of Strahd, they cannot truly defeat the vampire in this scenario.

Maps for Online Play

Because of the timing, it's best to run this scenario mostly in the theater of the mind. It can help, however, for the players to see the rooms they're in and what rooms they've already explored. The maps in Curse of Strahd follow the isometric versions found in the original I6 Ravenloft module but you can find top-down maps on the DM's Guild. I preferred these realistic Ravenloft maps.

When running online, you can use a lasso-style copy and paste utility to grab the part of the map the characters have seen and avoid showing rooms they haven't yet gotten to. With some practice, this is a fast way to show off parts of this massive dungeon.

Strahd's Interjections

Throughout the session, Strahd might join in another encounter and harass the party. He may arrive in his hybrid bat form or his hybrid wolf form, poke at the party, and then leave. Each time Strahd arrives, his entrance is foreshadowed by his children of the night ability.

Facing Strahd von Zarovich

45 minute before the end of the game, Strahd arrives and unleashes his full power. Take a few minutes to read Strahd's full entry in the book before the game to remember all of his intricacies. As a spellcasting vampire, Strahd is a complicated monster to run.

If the characters have the three items, Strahd may find himself at at a great disadvantage. Greater invisibility may end up his most dangerous spell, removing any disadvantage he has, preventing him from being targeted by spells that require sight, letting him move freely without opportunity attacks, and preventing his spells from getting countered. This does, however, remove his ability to charm. Whether he casts it before he engages in combat or if things start to look bad for him is up to you. Strahd's spider climb is an effective way of staying out of reach of powerful melee characters. His charm ability is likely best dropped on those with poor wisdom saving throws and Strahd is smart enough to avoid elves (who have advantage against charms) or paladins with crazy-high saving throw bonuses. Non-elven fighters and non-wisdom spellcasters are the best targets. For more tactics on running vampires, see the Monster Knows What They're Doing on Vampires.

Strahd is likely a hard challenge for a group of 7th level characters. If you happen to be running him at a higher level or feel he needs to be beefed up, add one or more of the following enhancements:

Increase Strahd's hit points up to to 200.
Give Strahd an AC of 17 (mage armor).
Increase the necrotic damage of Strahd's bite to 14 (4d6) or 21 (6d6).
Make these changes to Strahd's prepared spells: shield instead of comprehend languages, mage armor instead of prestidigitation, counterspell instead of nondetection, lightning bolt instead of fireball, and dispel magic instead of scrying.
Give Strahd Beguiling Gaze: As a bonus action, Strahd fixes his gaze on a creature he can see within 30 feet of him. If the target can see Strahd, the target must succeed on a DC 17 Wisdom saving throw or Strahd has advantage on attack rolls against the target. The effect lasts until the target takes damage or until the start of Strahd's next turn. For that time, the affected creature is also a willing target for Strahd's bite attack. A creature that can't be charmed is immune to this effect. A creature that successfully saves against Strahd's gaze is immune to it for 1 hour.

If you have more than four characters, consider adding one vampire spawn for each character above four. These spawn may serve as Strahd's brides. If you want to give them some mechanical flavor, you can give them the capabilities of a mage, veteran, or assassin (without the poison).

A Halloween Tradition

With Curse of Strahd in hand and your streamlined plans in place, you can make Castle Ravenloft your very own Halloween D&D tradition.

New to Sly Flourish? Start here, subscribe to the weekly newsletter, or support Sly Flourish on Patreon!

Check out Mike's books including Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master, the Lazy DM's Workbook, Fantastic Adventures, and Fantastic Adventures: Ruins of the Grendleroot.

Support Sly Flourish by using these links to purchase the D&D Essentials Kit, Players Handbook, Monster Manual, Dungeon Master's Guide, or dice from Easy Roller Dice.

Send feedback to @slyflourish on Twitter or email mike@mikeshea.net.

This article is copyright 2020 by Mike Shea of Sly Flourish.

Using the Guilds of Ravnica in Eberron

Mashing up the ideas from published D&D books is one of the best ways to capitalize off of the massive benefit from published books while, at the same time, turning published worlds into one of our own. Today we'll take two campaign sourcebooks from very different origins: the Guildmaster's Guide to Ravnica and Eberron: Rising from the Last War. While they each have a unique focus, both of these books work surprisingly well together. We can, for example, use the guilds from Ravnica to fill out some of the lesser known factions of Eberron.

Let's take a look.

Rakdos and the Mockery

Eberron's pantheon includes a group of sinister gods known as the Dark Six. Little is given for these six gods other than evocative names and a couple of lines of description. The Guildmaster's Guide to Ravnica, however, gives over huge sections to their guilds. What if we took material from Ravnica's Cult of Rakdos and turned it into the cult behind the Mockery, one of the dark six?

The Children of Mockery, as we'll call them, often perform in small towns, villages, and cities. For the most part they stay just above the law but their shows often turn violent and it isn't uncommon for members of the audience to disappear during the performances. The Children also host bloody gladiatorial events that draw in contestants from all over Khorvaire. It is said the Children have their own city of entertainment just on the edge of the Demon Wastes though no one knows exactly how to find it until it wants to be found.

Monsters of the Droaam sometimes split their loyalty between the Children of Mockery and the Daughters of Sora Kell. There's a shaky truce between the two groups, one that could shatter under the wrong circumstances.

Some say a demon leads the Children of Mockery and acts as the master of ceremonies in this hidden city of blood and debauchery.

Using the Cult of Rakdos for the Children of Mockery gives us a ton of value. We fill in a few lines of text in Eberron: Rising from the Last War with a huge section of the Guildmaster's Guide to Ravnica. We have all kinds of fantastic art we can use and show our players. We have an awesome selection of monsters and stat blocks that fit perfectly with the Mockery. It works perfectly and requires almost no work at all from us to integrate.

Gruul Clans and the Droaam

The wild and bestial nature of the Gruul clans works well within the Droaam, the nation of monsters in Khorvaire. The various clans can be lifted right from Ravnica and dropped in as clans within the loose bonds of the Droaam who follow the daughters of Sora Kell, the three hag leaders of the Droaam.

Orzhov Syndicate and Karrnath

The bond between the living and the dead in the nation of Karrnath fits well with the lawful evil Orzhov syndicate, a guild of bankers and religious leaders ruled by the undead. The banking aspect of the Orzhov isn't a clean fit but the societal connection between the living and the dead fits very well indeed.

Golgari Swarm and Avassh, the Twister of Roots

We can delve deep into the realms of the Daelkyr, the lords of madness in the depths of Khyber and draw upon the Golari swarm to fill out the followers of Avassh, the Twister of Roots. It's given only a single line in Eberron: Rising from the Last War that's mostly filled with evil plant stuff but the necrotic hivemind of the Golgari swarm fits nicely with that description. The locations and monsters work perfectly for this necrotic-touched plant-based lord of madness.

House Dimir and House Thuranni

The dragonmarked house of Thuranni is a good fit for the material from House Dimir in the Guildmaster's Guide to Ravnica. The fact that the house could be led by a vampire is pretty compelling and the overlap of spies and assassins makes it a good fit.

Izzet League and House Cannith

The chaotic and inventive nature of the Izzet League fits well with House Cannith. Both of them seek invention over all and may have caused catastrophic chaos in the past.

Simic Combine and the Cult of the Dragon Below

The strange fascination of magic and biology can fall under the umbrella of the cults of the Dragon Below. Cult members may exist in other dragonmarked houses or hidden away in the chambers beneath Sharn conducting horrible experiments that focus on the nexus of biology and magic we find with the Simic Combine.

Art, Maps, Adventure Seeds, NPCs, Monsters

When we pull the guilds out of Ravnica, we get a ton of material we can drop into our Eberron game largely untouched. The guilds in the Guildmaster's Guide include fantastic art, adventure seeds, location maps, NPC descriptions, and awesome monsters. All of this expands our Eberron game without us having to do much work at all. Steal, mash up, and build new worlds you and your players can experience.

New to Sly Flourish? Start here, subscribe to the weekly newsletter, or support Sly Flourish on Patreon!

Check out Mike's books including Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master, the Lazy DM's Workbook, Fantastic Adventures, and Fantastic Adventures: Ruins of the Grendleroot.

Support Sly Flourish by using these links to purchase the D&D Essentials Kit, Players Handbook, Monster Manual, Dungeon Master's Guide, or dice from Easy Roller Dice.

Send feedback to @slyflourish on Twitter or email mike@mikeshea.net.

This article is copyright 2020 by Mike Shea of Sly Flourish.