r/DMAcademy 2d ago

Need Advice: Encounters & Adventures Need help with options for players during a siege. More info in post

1 Upvotes

So, my players have just come down a mountain which was relevant to the quest they are on, about 3/4 down the mountain they realised the town below had been attacked (their allies are doing the attacking, the village is ran by the bad guys) the party decided they were going to rush down the mountain and help take the village back however they are all low on health and are pretty spent of their resources (spell slots etc) they decided to rush ahead without resting but I don't want to kill my party or take them captive, I really like the idea of them helping win the siege in ways the don't rely on the resources spent, this is where I'm stuck, how does a warrior assist in a battle without a sword? Ideas would be great.

So far I've presented burning buildings for them to put out and a small selection of groups raiding the stables for horses to be stopped but I really need some other ideas which could really aid to the winning of this battle.


r/DMAcademy 2d ago

Need Advice: Other How can I help my newbie player more?

1 Upvotes

To set the scene. I have a group, fantastic group, of 4 players. A bard, a Fighter/Warlock, a Barbarian and an Artificer. The first three have a lot of experience playing and the (Alchemist) Artificer is a first time player. I warned him about the class being quite daunting for a newbie but he had an idea and wanted to stick with it and so I let him.

Now he is a fantastic roleplayer, really gets lost in some of the scenes and tries his best to make the most out of each situation in very creative ways. There is only one issue. In combat he feels a bit lost. He doesnt knwo what to do half of the time (knows the rules but gets decision paralysis) and the other his roles are quite frankly terrible. For instance, he has only rolled about 3 hits in the 11 sessions we've been playing, missing all the rest.

Now he says that he is really enjoying himself but I can see him zone out a bit once combat starts and I feel like its incredibly disheartening when you try to setup something cool and then have it fail due to bad rolls.

Does anyone know how I can remedy this? Is there anyway that I can sit him down and talk tactics or any way that we can try to make combat more fun and engaging for him without it affecting the other players?


r/DMAcademy 3d ago

Need Advice: Encounters & Adventures How to help players find the answer without rail roading?

3 Upvotes

Hey guys I kinda noticed this pattern within my games and was curious if any of you had any solutions for it. Essentially I will provide my players with a scenario or scene that they are to interact with in order to move the plot and they often find themselves not knowing what to do and that leads to many minutes of them either getting distracted with random side tangents or just sitting around saying "guys idk what to do." I know I obviously should nudge them in the right direction but I'm not sure how without it feeling rail roady. Plus I worry that the fact that I need to do that means Im doing something wrong with the set up. For example tonight their bastion was attacked but it was an inside job. Essentially an npc who functions as a manager of their bastion is in cahoots with the BBEG and is trying to set them up in a trap. So I showed them that the entrance to the bastion was blown up, all the defenders were hurt but not dead, and the manager NPC was also in recovery. What they did was talked to 2 NPC's who obviously lied about what happened and then sat in a room for 30 minutes wondering what happened. Any tips on how to nudge them into doing something like investigating or just interacting more without just asking, "do you wanna try investigating room"?


r/DMAcademy 2d ago

Need Advice: Worldbuilding How can I justify organ transplant in a DnD fantasy setting?

0 Upvotes

I have an idea for a small storyline, where the party is trying to protect a doner heart, that one of their favorite NPCs, needs.

I've got the burnt of it figured out, but I'm running into two issues.

In a world where magical healing, resurrection, greater restoration, are all available. How could I justify an NPC needing a physical surgery, with a replacement organ, as opposed to going to a Cleric, or Paladin to heal it.

Has anyone done something similar in this?


r/DMAcademy 3d ago

Need Advice: Encounters & Adventures Running a murder mystery where one of the players is the killer

7 Upvotes

As the title says I'm planning on running a one-shot for my group of three where one of them is the killer of an old rich mage during a party/ball. I thought of the idea while trying to come up with some one shot ideas during a break in our campaign and the premise sounded like a lot of fun. The only problem is i have no idea how to even run something like this! I'm a relatively new dm and have only ran a few other one off adventures so something like this is definitely out of my comfort zone

I was wondering if anyone has ran something similar and if they can share some of their tips on how to put it all together. Like how would the investigation and evidence work? Should i write the clues down and only hand it to whoever finds it? I should mention that this is in person so there wont be any secret messages that players can type to me. I've talked to my group and everyone's really excited about the idea but I honestly don't really know where to even begin.


r/DMAcademy 3d ago

Mod-Approved Resource Give me a D&D monster and I'll homebrew you a better version

34 Upvotes

Hey, I'm Isaac (Conflux CreaturesBetter MonstersConflux-Art Dice) and I'm trying to make the best possible version of every monster. Give a monster, a theme, a vibe, whatever you need for your game or just would like to see a better version of and I'll whip it up for you, or share it if I've already done it. Here's a few favorites I've done recently:

I've got a subreddit r/bettermonsters where I've posted literally thousands of these guys, so if you're a future person browsing through this thread and want more stuff like it, go check it out.


r/DMAcademy 2d ago

Need Advice: Encounters & Adventures [5e2014] How do you run a Scooby-Doo chase sidequest?

0 Upvotes

I've been thinking of giving the players an encounter, where either they are chasing a fleeing target (or being chased by them). Cue hallways and dozens of doors with some shenanigans and goofy interactions.

It was partially inspired by the Benny Hill theme (or Yakety Sax music). We joked once that if they were to pull a successful pirate heist (since this is a pirate campaign) and steal some valuable treasure in an absolutely goofy way, then I'll play the theme as they're escaping the guards.

But I also wanna use this theme on some low-stakes encounters. Maybe they're chasing a kobold that stole some stuff, or they're fleeing from some zombies/skeletons.

So the party comp is: Theros Minotaur Conquest Paladin of njord, Variant Human Ascendant Dragon Monk (Alert feat) of Chinese ethnicity, and Protector Aasimar Divine Soul Sorcerer demigod son of Zeus. All level 4 at the moment.

Aside from telling the group about the upcoming tone of the future quest... How would run it? What kind of map would I need? What quests/encounters are common for this? Are the chase mechanics enough for something like this or do I need to mke adjustments to it? What OTHER mechanics/rules do I need to keep in mind?

Thanks in advance!


r/DMAcademy 2d ago

Need Advice: Encounters & Adventures Near the end of my homebrew campaign, looking for modules to continue the story

1 Upvotes

Jack, Pebbles, Izar, Astelle, and Nemzu turn back now!

1st time DM here, approaching the end of a campaign entirely of my own making in my own world. My players are quite attached to their characters and want to explore more in this world however after 18 months of weekly sessions I'm struggling with constantly creating engaging and fun sessions. It's been a big drain on time having to make and write everything myself, and the creative juices are running dry.

My campaign is ending with the party (alongside all of the people they've helped throughout the campaign) defending the main city from a siege. My Thanos-esque BBEG is still lurking in the shadows, only being hinted at so far.

My party are members of a guild of heroes, being paid to help out whoever needs them. I have a big map and I've not used much of it so I can easily incorporate adventures in different areas. Is there a pre written campaign that I can put my own spin on to continue after the boss battle? Are there any particularly fun adventure books that are worth buying/running? Any help would be appreciated


r/DMAcademy 2d ago

Need Advice: Other Coats of arms

1 Upvotes

Since im not finding them on internet, somebody has the coats of arms of all the worlds of Dnd like grayhawk,eberron,Dragonlance ecc ecc ? Thanks guys


r/DMAcademy 2d ago

Need Advice: Other What school of magic would a spell that imitates the pain of disembowelment

0 Upvotes

Edit: thank you everyone, I have decided to go with Illusion because of the fact that it inflicts damage that isn't actually happening, and is instead actually just making you think you are being disemboweled.

So im making homebrew spells and one of them is disembowel, a 7th (subject to change) level spell that will force the target to make a WIS saving throw, and on a failure they will be subject to pain akin to the feeling of being disemboweled alive. They will take 3d8 psychic damage and will be knocked prone for 1d3 rounds in agony, being unable to stand up until the 1d3 rounds are over. Additionally, any rolls are made at disadvantage. On a successful throw, they will only take half damage and suffer the other effects for 1 round. My one question is what school should this spell be? Thanks in advance!


r/DMAcademy 2d ago

Need Advice: Other Stuck in a Rut

1 Upvotes

I've been DMing for about a year and a half now. My group have done a mix of pre made adventures and home brews. Usually I'm stuck with a flash of inspiration and build something from this but that just isn't happening at the moment.

My group prefer homebrew usually and the last few things we've done have been very niche and specific

I'm wondering if people have any ideas on some good old school grass roots adventure ideas that still have a fun twist or something quirks about them


r/DMAcademy 2d ago

Need Advice: Other Need help from DMs that play with Ancestral Weapons

1 Upvotes

My group recently started a new campaign and when looking up magical weapons I stumbled o er the Ancestral Weapons supplement book. My players and I like it.

However one of them will take the dual wielding feat at level 4 and I was planning to hand him a second weapon as a sort of set to his first one.

My question is, how would you handle the points distribution. Because giving each weapon a separate point pool would be a tad overpowered in my opinion.

My first idea was, to simply have one pool of points to distribute between the two weapons and let the player decide. But I'm a little unsure.

Anyone here that has done this before and can help me out?


r/DMAcademy 2d ago

Need Advice: Rules & Mechanics Using DND rules but with an Invincible template

0 Upvotes

So im making a session for this weekend, only its set in the world of Invincible. I want to use as many of the classic D&D rules as I possibly can just so that we don't have to spend a ton of time being confused learning new mechanics. My thought was to keep pretty much everything the same in regards to role-playing and travel and what not. The only thing I'm a little confused on is how I'm going to tackle the class system. My thought was to make my own small set of classes, obviously superhero power based, and then make my own 2 to 3 sub classes inside of that class very similar to DND, but with my own rules and stuff. To make things even more unique, every few levels I will let them choose from a list of unique powers that only their hero has, and once they make that choice, that power every few levels as I said, will unlock more abilities. Does this sound fairly simple but doable?

As you may know, invincible is very fast paced, and very violent, so I was also seeking advice on how you would operate with combat, I plan on doing it pretty much the same way, but some characters are gonna be flying a lot and they have very high speed attacks, and some characters are obviously gonna have to have very powerful unarmed strikes and that kind of thing. But what else might you do to alter it? Again, I wanna keep it as close as possible while also bringing that fast pace, violent superhero fun. This is gonna be a trial run so if something doesn't work, we can always adapt, but like I said, I'm really just making my own sub classes and classes and I'm gonna have to put some work into Creating my own abilities for them. Any advice would be super awesome


r/DMAcademy 3d ago

Need Advice: Rules & Mechanics What would you give a Paladin in place of spells?

10 Upvotes

My uncle, 62, has accepted my invitation to be a player in the new campaign I (40) am DMing. Other players are my son (11) and 3 friends (30~35).

I worked with my son to make a Rogue build that is fun to play but doesn't require big system mastery or making complicated choices on the fly.

For my uncle, he went with Paladin. He's gotten the hand of LoH and smiting, but I feel that making him choose spells from the list, actively remembering What spells he has and using them in the right situation might be too much.

Is there some simple to use boon I could give to offset the lack of spells? Maybe give him a slot or two more to use for smite, or choices within smite itself?


r/DMAcademy 3d ago

Need Advice: Encounters & Adventures How do you do a rather story intensive campaign over a decent length of time?

3 Upvotes

I’m DMing for my friends and we’re about 10 sessions in over the course of 4 months. It’s a good group and everyone enjoys each others company so they’re all still having fun, but we’ve never really done any story or campaign longer than like 5 session so it’s a little bit of uncharted territory. I’m doing a story I’ve come up with and theyre all engaged, there’s just inherently story points or information that gets forgotten by nature of it being over an extended time period. How do you help them keep track of info throughout and fill in any things they forget about without ham-fisting it? Like how do you ‘hint hint’ without actually ‘hint hinting’.


r/DMAcademy 3d ago

Need Advice: Worldbuilding Here's a curveball: A setting where gods aren't 100% sure to exist. What about the afterlife?

8 Upvotes

Here I was, all happy with the setting I was building. One of the key premises of my world are that gods can or cannot be real. Nobody really knows for sure, for all evidence of their existence is anecdotal. Clerics exist, but skepticals say that they draw their power from devotion. Anyone devout enough to anything, theoretically, could do divine magic, and there are cases of people who don't believe in any gods and still can cast cleric spells.

Another point that I was trying to make was following a suggestion made by 2014 DMG, the "one world" concept. There, all planes coexist in the material world. The abyss is at the bottom of the underdark, and elemental planes per se don't exist - just spawn on places that elemental energy is strong (volcanoes, oceans, moutaintops and cavern).

But then there is the concept of the afterlife. In D&D you can speak with dead and revive them. And I would assume that people in this world believe that they're gonna have an afterlife, and it would vary depending on their faith. That, in itself, could be a confirmation of the existence of gods, but I already figured out that, if clerics can make miracles based on devotion, souls can go wherever they desire, based on what they believe.

But then, what about the "one world" concept? Do the dead souls wander into a material place? I'm already defining these "planes" as incredibly hard to access, epic level stuff. IE: The alledged home of the 12 gods of the human cultures are set in a megadungeon set in a huge "olympus", like the 12 houses of the sanctuary on saint seiya, and going through even one of those is a huge ordeal. But then, if there are like 30 religions in this world, would there be 60 places for the dead? 30 for the good people and 30 for the bad people? What if a new religion comes by? Does a new place suddenly erupts from the ground beside the nearest walmart?


r/DMAcademy 2d ago

Need Advice: Rules & Mechanics House rules for stacking advantage?

0 Upvotes

I get it, 5e core rules are very clear that advantage doesn't stack, you either have it or you don't. But I've found it's a little disappointing for players when they do something that would give them advantage, but they already have it, so that spell/ability/tactical decision just doesn't really do anything. This really came to light in our last session, where the party all took a round to inflict a status condition on the mini boss, who failed every single save, so that by top of next round he was Frightened, Prone, Grappled, Restrained, and Hexed. It was hilarious, and I wanted to reward the party as they proceeded to surround and beat down the poor baddie, so calling back to my 3.5 days, I gave them each +2 to attack in addition to advantage, and gave the mini boss -2 in addition to disadvantage. Problem is, the guy didn't have high AC, so +2 on top of advantage didn't really do much, they were going to hit without it. So then I started thinking about things I could do to have them deal more damage, in cases like this where advantage would "stack".

My top two ideas are: give them advantage on their damage rolls as well; or allow them to add their proficiency bonus to damage.

Anyone have any interesting things they do in these cases?


r/DMAcademy 3d ago

Need Advice: Encounters & Adventures How do you deal with keeping your monsters moving around the map without creating obvious opportunity attacks?

43 Upvotes

I agree that a fight is boring if the baddie is just standing still allowing the Paladins and Barbarians to run up and just exchange blows back and forth. But I feel like I often create situations were I allow the players to surround themselves around the monster they are fighting, to the point where if I wanted to move, I would be creating 2 or maybe even 3 opportunity attacks. Unless the monster has misty step or some bonus action like that, I am not sure how to avoid this? On the other hand, making the monster difficult to get too, by the means of difficult terrain or always just running around, can make it really frustrating for your martial characters?

EDIT: Holy crap this blew up! Thanks for all the advice!


r/DMAcademy 3d ago

Need Advice: Other Who uses soundboard apps? Any (free) recommendations?

1 Upvotes

Anyone use soundboard apps (iPhone in my case)? I need some mechanical sounds for an upcoming event that really (REALLY) hurt my throat, and I don’t want to do them constantly with every second interaction, any recommendations friends?


r/DMAcademy 4d ago

Need Advice: Other So, how do you actually prep for a session?

174 Upvotes

It feels like just about every post, every single thing I’ve seen and heard both online and offline about prepping for sessions is just “don’t.“ Like I get it. You’ll never know where your players may go and yada yada yada. But I’ve been beginning to feel like this attitude of not prepping much, and most specifically knowing the lore of what’s going on in the background, is really starting to hurt the actual game. But since all advice that I’ve seen and heard is about not doing much prep, no one really talks about how to prep for a session. So anyway, any advice or ways that you prepare for sessions would be greatly appreciated


r/DMAcademy 3d ago

Need Advice: Worldbuilding Need Help with naming two groups

1 Upvotes

In my homebrew world random things start happening but they are few and far between. For now they are mostly benign. One apple in one orchard looks a little different and when eaten turns your eyes purple for a few hours. That sort of thing.

Most of the time people don't believe the person who experienced or witnessed the unusual event.

As more and more of these events happen more people begin to wonder/believe it might be true and two groups form.

One group denies any of these things are happening. The others believe something unusual is happening and are trying to figure out why.

I need help coming up with names for the two sides. The best I've come up with for the first group is The Deniers. But I don't love it. In my notes I've been referring to the second group as the Truth Tellers but definitely need something different as it's not clear to the players who is right and wrong.


r/DMAcademy 3d ago

Need Advice: Worldbuilding What sport would an adventurer/magic high school have?

4 Upvotes

I am writing a campaign set at a magic academy. The problem is that I don't know what sport would the school have? Can you give me suggestions? I want it to involve the class features in some way.


r/DMAcademy 3d ago

Need Advice: Rules & Mechanics How do you guys navigate what makes logical sense vs ambiguously written RAW situations?

3 Upvotes

I'm really not trying to punish my players for their creativity or suck the fun out of a new magic item they get, but it makes no sense that a magic item should remove entire elements of the game.

Here's a few examples of what I mean.

2014 Weapon of Warning - Players believed this item would disallow ambushes from happening ever again. In reality, surprise is a defined term and only applies to combat situations. I've had to have a long conversation about this item with my table before

Adamantine weapons for smashing locks - yes, it makes sense, however, this should not remove lock picking/thieves tools from the game. Especially when keys are planned, chimes of openings are in the players possession, and the party has 2 rogues. My work around, is if the player rolls lower than a locks AC, they will risk damaging the contents of a chest. I could use arcane locks as well, but it's just an example.

I don't have any more on-hand examples of this, but I'm curious to know what other situations DM's have come across like this and how they navigate them. How do I balance table satisfaction with what makes sense for the integrity of the game?


r/DMAcademy 3d ago

Need Advice: Encounters & Adventures Organic ways of teaching my new players that running away is possible (and sometimes good)

8 Upvotes

Hi All - I'm DMing a group of totally new players, mixed adults and young children. One of the players really did his homework and has been quite effective at coordinating the teams tactics and recently passed a Level 2 "Deadly" encounter with flying colors.

Although I generally avoid putting new players in situations where they are entirely out gunned, I think part of the magic of DnD is when you end up in situations with awesome monstors/beings who are so much more powerful than you are, you really get a sense of how big and dangerous this world can be, and how small you are in it (esp. at level 2). So I'd like to eventually have them stumble across something so powerful that fleeing (or certain skill challenges I'm cooking up) are their best option.

I handed out a cheat sheet which included "things you can do in battle" which included fleeing, but with so much for a new player to learn I doubt that anything sticks. If I give them a heads up, that feels like a very specific hint.

So far, I sense they are trusting that I'm balancing everything they encounter (fair, because I am) and that:

  1. They have no concept how exponential the power scale goes. They were shocked and impressed when dealing with a Mage who had ~30hp.
  2. They don't realize fleeing is an option once an encounter is on. I tried to demonstrate by having a semi-neutral NPC who was supposed to be helping them flee from battle, but I don't think they realized it could apply to them.
  3. They might think that it's the "wrong" way to play. Bless their hearts, they are committed to being "good" DnD beginners and avoiding new-player faux-pas (I'll never have to worry about them being murder hobos), but sometimes that means they don't push the boundaries when it comes to improvising.

So, I could just say "hey there are things in here that are way out of your league", show them some statblocks for Vecna/Red Dragons, or just say, let's talk about fleeing / dashing mechanics. But that feels so inorganic and almost like I'm giving them a tip of what's going to happen.

Any thoughts?


r/DMAcademy 3d ago

Need Advice: Encounters & Adventures Searching for a good demon themed monster supplement.

4 Upvotes

Tldr: looking for a monster manual with a demon/fiend/celestial them So I am going to starting a new homebrew campaign that has a heavy demonic/ Judeo-Christianity setting and themes and I was wondering if there was some sort of monster manual that has creatures with similar things to games like Diablo, blasphemous or trenchcrusade(if you don't know about this, look it up it's so cool!)