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BallisticClipboard posted:I'm taking my players to an "adventurer training arena" (an indoor play place, like Discovery Zone) and I'm wondering if you guys any playful variations on traps or puzzle rooms in a dungeon. For example, I have a pit trap but they fall into a ball pit. I also need some things at a ticket redemption zone, like what's the big prize junior adventurers save up for? Or even midtier prizes. The Floor Is Lava pit. Confetti explosion trap. Katamari boulder. Stairs turn into Slip 'n' Slide. Lemonade acid spray. Pinata enemies. Big prize could be an actual magic item. Mid tier: Iron golem, displacer beast and beholder plushies that take a hit for you, give you concealment or let you make a magic ray attack respectively, counting as a consumable item. Lowest tier: spider rings that make drow slightly more friendly towards you. My Lovely Horse fucked around with this message at 09:56 on Dec 6, 2018 |
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Dec 6, 2018 09:53
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Low tier is Real Hero Weapons That Actually Work! There's no trick to it. It's a functional weapon and it has an embarrasing picture and nameplate on the handle of Fred Fighterman (longsword) Axebeard Alehammer (battle axe) Godwin The Good (warhammer), or Doomshadow Darkshade (dagger).
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Dec 6, 2018 10:36
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Xanathar’s Guide has an excellent section on low-level, slightly rubbish magic items like a candle that burns underwater, a cloak that can change colour and armour that never gets dirty. They would work for your mid-tier items and you could make it a lucky dip that they roll for rather than letting them choose or you choosing for them.
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Dec 6, 2018 10:46
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AlphaDog posted:Low tier is Real Hero Weapons That Actually Work! there should also be small buckets of normal adventuring items one can blow tiny amounts of tickets on such as caltrops and candles and generic spell components for 1-5 tickets
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Dec 6, 2018 11:42
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Top tier is a single item. The Legendary Sword Of Ace Mainguy, which looks exactly like the Fred Fighterman sword, but heavily used, with a much plainer looking hilt without the name plate and picture. It costs one hundred billion tickets, but otherwise appears perfectly normal and does not detect as magic or anything else weird. The bored teenager behind the desk just shrugs if you ask him and says "Yeah, that's always been there. I think it's like a joke or something. I don't even have a key that gets it out". The next most expensive item costs 2,500 tickets. There are exactly 5 spare boxes of exactly 10,000 tickets each in the store room. If asked, the kid says they have to order 4 or 5 new boxes every six months. This, too, is no trick. The sword is exactly what the label says it is - it's the actual sword that was really used by the world's most legendary hero when he did his most heroic legendary stuff. Elector_Nerdlingen fucked around with this message at 12:37 on Dec 6, 2018 |
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Dec 6, 2018 12:32
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Watch some YouTube clips of Legends of the Hidden Temple, and steal liberally.
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Dec 6, 2018 13:06
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Any suggestions for encounters in an abandoned water temple that has been taken over by the lesser god of water-bourne disease? Looking for creatures, puzzles - anything really that would fit that theme. Edit: has anyone ever used any pathfinder flipmats or the WoTC dungeon tiles? Are they any good? Sanford fucked around with this message at 22:57 on Dec 8, 2018 |
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Dec 8, 2018 22:54
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Sanford posted:Any suggestions for encounters in an abandoned water temple that has been taken over by the lesser god of water-bourne disease? Looking for creatures, puzzles - anything really that would fit that theme. A room with one or more Blue Ochre Jelly posing as water in a pit fall. If they fail whatever puzzle or trigger a trap, down they go. I'd not have the pit be the exact size of the Jelly though, let them hit the ground, and then have the puddle in the corner come after them. Or have it fall from the ceiling near the entire party, so they can all fight it, would work too, depending on their level. Also, obligatory Ocarina of Time Water Temple water level puzzle. A puzzle based on changing the state of water (solid, liquid, gas) to pass it. If it is a formerly used water temple and a god of water-borne disease is running shop now, I'd imagine a lot of stagnant water and the accompanying insects would be everywhere. You could have a death by exsanguination from a mosquito swarm event.
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Dec 9, 2018 01:00
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That puzzle with the three buckets to measure out a specific volume
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Dec 9, 2018 02:01
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Have a bunch of water passages where the PCs have to swim though them to get to the next part of the unsubmerged temple. Have them encounter suckered tentacles that try to pull them out of the water sections through holes into the murky abyss beyond. Maybe a sub-boss of a giant squid or Kraken depending on level. Could have the temple slowly begin to fill with water as the time goes on, imparting a sense of urgency.
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Dec 9, 2018 02:44
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The entire temple is filled with just enough water that it gets in their boots. Their feet are never dry at all, and it's gross stagnant water. They have to face the most awful threat of all: Trench Foot.
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Dec 9, 2018 03:41
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dreadmojo posted:That puzzle with the three buckets to measure out a specific volume
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Dec 9, 2018 10:18
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I'm staunchly anti-puzzle when it comes to campaigns. Generally, players completely stop roleplaying while they try to figure out a traditional math-based puzzle. It can kinda work if the GM awards hints based on wisdom or int rolls... But it still feels like the player and not the character is solving the puzzle.
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Dec 9, 2018 19:32
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Perhaps they, if they are clever and observant enough, might discover the mysteries of the previous cult of the water deity and use some of those rituals to aid them or impede the bog water god (say, rituals of Cleansing, or Change, or whatever domains might apply).
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Dec 9, 2018 22:20
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More music recommendations for GMs! --------------------- Richard Allen Harvey's KPM 1000 Series British composer who put out a ton of instrumental albums - Unnatural Causes 1, Unnatural Causes 2, Traditions, Folk Songs, and Nifty Digits are all insanely fantastic (although I wish the tracks were longer). Skip around Unnatural Causes 1 and you'll immediately see how perfect a lot of this stuff is for GMing.  https://open.spotify.com/album/4EnGh3hY3J9pQzQJIZhjg0?si=F_pw5_SYTx6pB1pFEBroEQ --------------------- Blake Mills: Look Lots of really pretty, long, spooky ambient. Tracks 2 ("Two") and 3 ("Three") would be really good for overworld travel stuff.  https://open.spotify.com/album/5cyqfx05ExCt4IrDBTsaI4?si=nUMKP8rbTWWMmJSqzKT5ZA --------------------- Bambounou: Parametr Parkusja The exact type of simple, looping percussive stuff that I love to use for combat.  https://open.spotify.com/album/3vQqv4l5YeJKT79GuOe1kn?si=fCSG6baTQCSrm_5M_tVI9Q https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iLMgKDCyh7s Polo-Rican fucked around with this message at 17:22 on Dec 13, 2018 |
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Dec 13, 2018 17:12
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One of my players got all teary-eyed at the heroic death speech of an NPC last night, and it was almost entirely lines from Civil War by Guns n’ Roses. “You cannot trust freedom when it’s not in your hands, my friends. Not when everyone is fighting for their own... promised... land.” *dies* Anyway, remember when sebmojo said my game was railroady? I drew my players a map so they could choose where to go:    Then one of them said they like that we’re in a city this time rather than a wilderness, and they’d like to stay here awhile. So I did this:  So I’ve got something of a campaign setting in which to set my campaign, and if they don’t want to engage with the big plot that’s cool. And there’s a southern continent for them to go to if they want. Now who’s railroady,
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Dec 13, 2018 19:35
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What are you going to do when they inevitably burn part of it down?
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Dec 13, 2018 19:38
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Sanford posted:One of my players got all teary-eyed at the heroic death speech of an NPC last night, and it was almost entirely lines from Civil War by Guns n’ Roses. I'm proud of u Those are great maps!
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Dec 13, 2018 20:14
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Keeshhound posted:What are you going to do when they inevitably burn part of it down? It’s paper, make the map match.
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Dec 13, 2018 20:16
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Bad Munki posted:It’s paper, make the map match. Get eyes of the stone thief and have it devoured by a spiteful sentient dungeon
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Dec 13, 2018 20:54
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I could use some advice to spicing up a real estate deal in a garrisoned town. Relevant info as succinctly as I can manage it (formatted for ease of reading): quote:Setting: Modified Birthright in a 5e D&D ruleset. Characters are level 3. Game is high RP, medium combat, slow progression sandbox. That basically covers the important points. Based on last week's session the party is likely to offer something like 1000gp up front, with 20gp/month for a time period until the debt is paid off. Math section: quote:I was going to use the DMG reference for generating monthly income. It averages to about 25gp/month profit if you just take the average math, roll monthly, and don't play MS Excel, the Tabletop Adventure Spreadsheets Simulator. However, if you roll for income daily, it's more like 700gp/month profit. One member of the party is a halfling shepherd druid with a background as a child of innkeepers, so he'd have some expertise in the tending and upkeep of an inn and tavern, so I would allow him to use advantage/expertise on daily or weekly rolls while the party was at home with some downtime. The idea here is that if they were home, they would make more money because the boss was there to ensure smooth operations. If they were away, the Noble background Paladin's retainers could manage the day-to-day operations for the basic income levels. Payments could be make either to the town's Master of Coin, or to a bank trust to the innkeep in the regional capital. What I'm looking for would be any sort of complicating factors that I could throw into the discussions. Things the innkeep might ask of them, or negotiating tactics he may adopt. Additional things like the garrison commander making requests of the new owners (whom he knows as a burgeoning adventuring company), a previous arrangement with the fence for the use of the property, expropriation of the building for an expanded barracks or some such. I don't want to make the situation insurmountable. If war breaks out, this becomes a front line position in the war. Nothing's pre-written in this game as to whether the war is going to kick off tomorrow or in a month or ever, but the possibility that this becomes either the first of many properties the company holds, *or* it is the start of what will become a fortified castle HQ from which the company will raise an army and retake the ancestral holdings of one of the members (who is an exiled prince) is a possibility.
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Dec 13, 2018 21:46
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After the purchase is complete and payment has changed hands, the either or both of the former owners should make sure to give them one last tour of the place so that they can give out some helpful tips, and stress that the party should absolutely, under no circumstances go into the old wine cellar, it was unused for 50 years when we bought this place and it's unsafe, that's why we boarded it up and then chained and padlocked it for good measure; don't want the local kids sneaking in there and getting hurt. What is actually in the wine cellar is up to you.
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Dec 13, 2018 23:32
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The innkeeper should probably bring up the death of their daughter during negotiations. Whether this is to drive up the price, force the PCs to buy through a cutout, or raise questions about what the daughter brought home during her last visit. A fine line should be walked between "an inn nice enough to attract garrison money," and "an inn nice enough to take over as our new officer's barracks."
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Dec 14, 2018 00:34
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Because of long distance and not wanting to take up a ton of peoples' scheduling time to negotiate Discord/Roll20 things, I'd like to see about doing a PBP campaign with some close friends Obviously there's a lot of resources I've found just through Googling and Reddit, but I was wondering if any of you have experience of do's and don'ts and any wisdom you'd be willing to share about best practices Much appreciated!
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Dec 14, 2018 00:44
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Players fight some disgusting goat men, then ask a priest about them. He says he’s never heard of goat men. Insight check, nat 20. He’s definitely lying. Player says “You’re lying! Tell me the truth!” Intimidation check, or should the nat 20 on the insight roll see him through to the actual truthful answer?
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Dec 19, 2018 23:53
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On the principle of not rolling more than once to do a thing, the successful insight roll includes the true answer: "He's lying! Because... He's a disgusting goat man in disguise!" (or whatever). Then if you've got that kind of group, ask the players how the characters figured it out.
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Dec 20, 2018 00:19
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Intimidation for the full truth, but the 20 should give insights on why he's lying.
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Dec 20, 2018 00:22
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Yea insight should get you 'you can tell he's lying and he looks nervous about it, he's got a secret about this that would tie him in' or something. Then intimidation is for him to go 'OH GODS I CONFESS I'M A GOAT MAN IN A TRENCH-COAT.' Obviously if this is just a throwaway side encounter you can have a nat 20 on insight just give you the answer but I've always run it as that roll tells you what's fishy, then you have to get them to stop loving about however you can.
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Dec 20, 2018 00:25
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Keeshhound posted:Intimidation for the full truth, but the 20 should give insights on why he's lying. Not revealing the whole truth is fine, but it's weird to say "with 100% certainty, you know he's lying. But you don't know why or anything". It's got nothing to do with the 20, even putting aside that 20s do nothing special on skill checks. You don't just know someone is lying without any clue as to why. That's not how it works, for real or in (good) fiction. The why is integral to the knowledge that they're lying. If you know, then you at least have some insight into why it's happening, otherwise you don't know, you just have a feeling.
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Dec 20, 2018 00:27
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My point was that a strong roll should give you clearer insights, like "when you say 'goat men', he immediately freezes, and his eyes dart back and forth between you and the altar." As opposed to just "when you say 'goat men' he freezes, and sweat begins to bead up on his face."
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Dec 20, 2018 00:35
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Keeshhound posted:My point was that a strong roll should give you clearer insights, like "when you say 'goat men', he immediately freezes, and his eyes dart back and forth between you and the altar." As opposed to just "when you say 'goat men' he freezes, and sweat begins to bead up on his face." With D&D's pass/fail skill system, I'd generally go with success being "He's trying too hard to stop himself looking at the altar as he denies all knowledge of disgusting goatmen". This is a group/game expectations thing, I'm sure. If you want to talk about using degrees of success for D&D, you shouldn't give a poo poo what the die shows, only what the final result is.
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Dec 20, 2018 00:48
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AlphaDog posted:Not revealing the whole truth is fine, but it's weird to say "with 100% certainty, you know he's lying. But you don't know why or anything". Nat 20 is one of those issues in this thread. I think giving some additional insight is fine, but based on what you might pick up by observing someone really really well. This is a good time to chuck in an additional clue about the nature of the lie if you can think of something, but not to reveal the whole thing. (If your players think nat 20 will always get them something extra then just tell them it won't.)
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Dec 20, 2018 00:59
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You need to come up with a stance and stick with it. Either improved effect for "crits" or more successes, or not. D&D afaik doesn't give anything by default but a lot of people like getting something extra when they crit. Be careful though, because some games completely break if you start doing that, but I don't think D&D is one of them.
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Dec 20, 2018 01:08
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sebmojo posted:...but not to reveal the whole thing... Lot of people apparently don't want to "reveal the whole thing", but after the first success, the GM hung out a big  HERE IS THE PLOT flag. They're not going to fail the next check and then just drop it! So, how many successes do the players need before they get access to the whole thing? How are you setting that number and why? What skills can be used? How are you communicating this to the players? What happens if they fail? That last bit is super important. Let's say they I INTIMIDATE and roll a 2. What comes next? They try another skill? Are you sure you're not just saying "I need someone to roll+mod = >15 before we keep playing"? Or are you pushing them to start a fight or something, in which case why not just tell them that? Elector_Nerdlingen fucked around with this message at 01:50 on Dec 20, 2018 |
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Dec 20, 2018 01:47
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That’s all helpful and good, thank you. AlphaDog, I am very aware of the “you just need to keep rolling” trap and it’s one of the things I’m trying to avoid. As it was the intimidation check was very average so I had the priest, after breaking out in a sweat and involuntarily making a holy symbol with his hands, say “I can’t... my oaths! The Lord Inquisitor would....” and then bolting through the back door. Now the players are trying to find a way to get a meeting with this Lord Inquisitor fella. My plan is that the goatmen are evil, but they were secretly placed in the caverns under the city by the (nominally) good guys to keep people away from an even greater evil. It’s messing with this greater evil that’s causing the goats to now tunnel up under people’s houses and eat everyone. I’m also glad to report that my cowardly alchemist player was a million times better than previously. One of the other players pointed it out and he said that after actually making some friends, and their success in a few fights, he’s starting to think he’s not the worthless piece of poo poo his father always said he was. He’s started doing exactly what someone said in the thread - talking about how scared he is, saying he is trembling and accidentally does a bit of wee down his leg, but then doing the scary thing anyway.
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Dec 20, 2018 08:02
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AlphaDog posted:Lot of people apparently don't want to "reveal the whole thing", but after the first success, the GM hung out a big Are you just advocating for no roll games now? Because while I'm sure there are plenty of games that allow for that, they're not what the question was being asked about.
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Dec 20, 2018 19:39
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Keeshhound posted:Are you just advocating for no roll games now? Because while I'm sure there are plenty of games that allow for that, they're not what the question was being asked about. There’s a difference between no-roll games and gating the entire plot behind a single check. If the Intimidate check comes up a 2, then there sure as poo poo better be a way to get the information through another means, like documents hidden in the priest’s office. Hell, if the Insight check came up a 2, then there should be opportunities for the players to suss out (via talking to townspeople, seeing suspicious things, etc.) that something is going wrong at the temple. A roll is there to make sure the current plan proceeds as normal. There’s plenty of other methods to do this. I like fail-forward, where a failed check might still give you what you want, just at a cost. A failed Intimidate check earns the scorn of the priest and he has you escorted from the temple, but in the process he lets slip something he shouldn’t. Failing to pick a lock means you get it, but it makes a lot of noise and alerts the people on the other side (although there’s something to be said for not requiring a check for that if there’s no consequences for failure other than something taking a little more time). D&D isn’t explicitly built for fail-forward, though, so proceed with caution.
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Dec 20, 2018 20:11
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blastron posted:There’s a difference between no-roll games and gating the entire plot behind a single check. If the Intimidate check comes up a 2, then there sure as poo poo better be a way to get the information through another means, like documents hidden in the priest’s office. Hell, if the Insight check came up a 2, then there should be opportunities for the players to suss out (via talking to townspeople, seeing suspicious things, etc.) that something is going wrong at the temple. A roll is there to make sure the current plan proceeds as normal.. Yeah? Flexibility is kind of the point of tabletop gaming. Sanford asked for a clarification on what narrative roll two different skills should be used for, and apparently that was seen as an impetus for a rant on how asking for multiple skill checks is making your players to roll too much.
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Dec 20, 2018 20:28
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A die is a terrible thing to waste
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Dec 20, 2018 20:47
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Keeshhound posted:Yeah? Flexibility is kind of the point of tabletop gaming. Sanford asked if there should be a second roll after that Insight check. I think there shouldn't be. Others said not to let just one successful check to provide enough information to proceed, but didn't mention how many checks they think there should be or what to do if one is a failure. I think it's important to think about those things before you call for a second check after the first success. How did you get "you must want games with no rolling" out of that? Do as many rolls as you want, understand that when you get past 2 or 3 the odds of succeeding at all of them go off a cliff, and know what you'll do if they fail. Elector_Nerdlingen fucked around with this message at 21:28 on Dec 20, 2018 |
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Dec 20, 2018 21:16
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