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Dungeons and Dragons Megathread

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Muhkat Lomorki said:
Hey, is it a good idea to polymorph the Barbarian into a T-Rex? I mean, it isn't as if they're going to be casting spells anyway.
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It certainly can be, gives some cool attacks, good health buffer, etc. and much more importantly thorn if it's a good idea or not mechanically, it's fucking awesome so you should totes do it.
 
erlking said:
It certainly can be, gives some cool attacks, good health buffer, etc. and much more importantly thorn if it's a good idea or not mechanically, it's fucking awesome so you should totes do it.
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Yes, the coolness factor is a big part to having fun in TTRPGs. Because there's a person in control of the encounters you fight, not a soulless, rigid program that can be gamed. You are also liable to get called out on for making everyone else's experience shit by trying to do all the things yourself.

I bring back up my old character idea of a Synthesist/Alchemist worshiper of Lamashtu in Pathfinder, with a heavy focus on using the Synthesist side for stuff to apply the Alchemist side to. Extra natural attacks, flight, a few buff spells and so on for the Synthesist side. The optimization basically turned it into a case of dumb op on Sneak Attack charges. Not actually optimal, but you'd be hard pressed to not have fun as a winged, 3-armed-2-tailed Goblin or something else crazy flying down to maul unsuspecting enemies with a pile of d6s attached to Suddenly Synthesist In Your Face. The alchemist side weakens the Synthesist side, but I don't care about that. I care about the fact that Alchemist has a better versatility of body-warping than Synthesist and can be a source of significant Sneak Attack and Natural Attack power for a probably-sub-optimal Sneak Attack Synthesist setup.

It's not optimal. It's less powerful than straight Synthesist 20. I don't care, because it's fucking Fun!
 
Alright DnD World Building Idea.

I just bought some of the Pre Age Of Mortals Dragonlance Books at a local Book Sale.

It was the original trilogy that really got me into DnD Novels as a whole.

Now since the Dragonlance Franchise is pretty much dead I had an idea.

Alternate Worlds are a thing that is referenced more often in the Dragonlance Portion of the DnD setting.

So here is the idea.

Chaos stirs in his prison, but he had a failsafe. In one of the Anthology Books he sent a ship to a World wherein the Kingpriest won and Overthrew the Gods (implied that Chaos gave him power to do so from within the Greygem), and tricked them into manipulating the Kingpriest into opening the Greygem.

That world was destroyed, and the characters realized that Chaos was trying to manipulate events into opening the Greygem and freeing his counterparts in All Possible Worlds.

The characters escaped the dying world, but it was left unknown what happened to them.

But that was not the only gambit Chaos took.

He manipulated others as well, and while the Gods of each world stopped them it did damage the boundaries between the alternate worlds.

This was enough that when Takhisis and Paladine became Mortal and both died that the Chaos of the main timeline was able to use the "shockwaves" of energy caused by Krynnspace reordering itself without two of it's Principle Gods to lay low their other incarnations in Alternate Timelines.

Needless to say this is causing untold destruction in these other worlds.

World 1: Canon Storyline Post Age of Mortals.

World 2: Huma is slain by Takhisis and Galen Drakos. The Dark Gods have ruled for a very long time, though the other Gods continue to challenge them.

World 3: The Kingpriest is slain by a Priest of Takhisis years before his madness brings down the Cataclysm. The tensions that exists prior to this are not abated, and many blame the Towers of High Sorcery for conspiring to cause this, leading to a Pogrom against all Mages.

Only the intervention of Paladine stops this, pointing out that Takhisis wants this to weaken the Mortal Realms.

Tensions still remain high, and the Elves who support Arcane Magic are in a state of Cold War with most of the Human Nations, with occasional hotspots to the modern era.

World 4: Lord Soth manages to avert the Cataclysm, but the ensuing chaos of the Kingpriests Murder by a Knight of Solamnia, even a disgraced one, leads to the various Priestly Orders turning on the Knights, and a long and prolonged War.

Solamnia is destroyed as a result.

World 5: Takhisis minions are stopped from stealing the Metallic Dragon Eggs as Paladine realizes she is breaking the Oath of Non Inteference by Gods after the Catalcysm.

The War of the Lance never takes place and the Gods have yet to return to Krynn.

World 6: Takhisis never steals the World after the Chaos War, but Primal Sorcery and Mysticism still arise, and the Alien Dragons who would have become the Dragon Overlords still enter Krynnspace.

While the Gods stop the worst of their Deprivations Takhisis uses Malystryx and the rest as pawns to bring in elements from "Outside" the Isolated Crystal Sphere of Realmspace.

Most notably it allows the spread of "Foreign Magics" such as Warlocks, Blackguards and other "Dark Magics" which Takhisis ruthlessly exploits to her advantage.

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Now we get to the meat of the story.

The Gods know something from World 1 (Canon Timeline) has rendered Takhisis and Paladine comatose in their respective worlds, and this is disrupting the very foundations of Kyrnnspace.

In some worlds the Nine Hells have made contact with Krynn, which was forbidden by the very nature of the world.

In others the Far Realm is now encroaching on Krynn.

And many other Planes and Foreign Gods are noticing Krynn, most notably Tiamat, who Takhisis originated as an Aspect of before being "Broken Off" when the High God of Krynnspaces sealed it off from most of the other DnD Worlds.

Unable to travel between the Parallel Worlds by Decree of the High God the various Gods of Krynnspace send Chosen Emissaries to try and fix the situation.

However this would mean the Revival of World 1's Paladine and Takhisis, which many oppose, especially the Dark Gods of World 1 who Takhisis betrayed when she Stole the World.

Meanwhile the various incarnations of Chaos are exploitinng the situation to weaken the Greygem and let their energies leak out to disrupt the worlds even more.

The goal of all the incarnations of Chaos is to Break Down the Barriers between Parallel Worlds, causing them all to crash into each other and cause unspeakable damage to their various sections of the Multiverse, and free Chaos to wreak havoc on other Planes.

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So how does this sound as an Epic Level Dragonlance Adventure?
 
Did up a rough sketch of the final battle in my group's 5e campaign.

 
So in the 5e DMG, the rules for throwing a bomb (pg 267) are "As an action, a character can light this bomb and throw it at a point up to 60 feet away. Each creature within 5 feet of that point must succeed on a DC 12 Dexterity saving throw or take 3d6 fire damage."

Does this count as an Attack? Or can a Thief Archetype Rogue throw out two bombs a turn using Fast Hands and his normal Action?
 
Walker of the Yellow Path said:
So in the 5e DMG, the rules for throwing a bomb (pg 267) are "As an action, a character can light this bomb and throw it at a point up to 60 feet away. Each creature within 5 feet of that point must succeed on a DC 12 Dexterity saving throw or take 3d6 fire damage."

Does this count as an Attack? Or can a Thief Archetype Rogue throw out two bombs a turn using Fast Hands and his normal Action?
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I'd say it's probably intended to not be an attack (so it doesn't work with multi attack), but I'd allow a thief to throw two bombs as long a sword it's cool learn that they can't sneak attack with the bombs as they're not ranged attacks.
 
So the game with the new DM eventually fell through and I got roped into playing with the old DM, new character, rolled an Eldritch Scion Magus since I never really got to use the one I'd made for the other campaign. And despite saying he was going to avoid the dustup we had over my Paladin apparently being OP it's happening again, we're level 2 and apparently the ability to hold the charge on a missed touch attack (something every spellcaster can do) and continue trying to land it indefinitely is OP now because "you can't do that with any other spells".
 
So, I'm currently working on a 5e adventure, for level 4 players. The basic premise is that the players are hired to protect scholars at a magical research site dedicated to dredging up esoteric magics and could-have-beens from alternate worlds that exist only in potential. They fight against weird creatures and esoteric elements from within the site itself, a camp of nightmare-worshipping bandit-cultists, and the Yuan-Ti using the cultists as catspaws to gain control of the site and alter it for their own purposes.

I've already made a plot outline, with the general shape of things, the features of relevant areas, and a list of the major players and their motivations. What I could use some help with, though, is ideas for weird esoteric magical things that the researcher might have dug up, as well as ideas for encounters that aren't strictly plot-related. If you have any ideas for stuff that might get help me get across the idea that the normal world is being tainted and influenced by things that are at best benignly ignorant and at worst knowingly hostile towards existence as we know it, I'd love to hear them!

Some things I've added so far include:
  • Alternate forms of the four elements - water/ice that is fundamentally brittle rather than fluid, and shatters into needle-shards to flow downhill before reforming into a crystalline pool; fire which is transformative rather than consumptive, and warps its fuel into abstract chitinous structures; or air which carries light rather than sound.
  • Forms of magic that do things which are unusual or beyond the normal scope of magic, but not necessarily powerful. One ritual, when performed freely, ensures that you forgive the subject with no lingering hard feelings. Another allows you to, by deliberately changing your fundamental identiy, change your true name.
  • Creatures that lacked a body, but assimilate people into their collective of identical bodies. They're also mindless, working purely on reflex to feed/assimilate, but they have all the knowledge of their victims. At the moment, they start by offering boons in exchange for partial transformation and behavioural limitations, but will attack and attempt to physically reshape people if no one accepts.
  • The beast that tipped the yuan-ti off to this place's existence in the first place - an obsidian-scaled serpent with the head of a lion, it's perfectly awake and aware in dreams, but a fragile and id-driven reality warper in the waking world. Killing it here just wakes it up into dreams, but it does weaken it and damge its wisdom score.
 
Wolf Ritter said:
So the game with the new DM eventually fell through and I got roped into playing with the old DM, new character, rolled an Eldritch Scion Magus since I never really got to use the one I'd made for the other campaign. And despite saying he was going to avoid the dustup we had over my Paladin apparently being OP it's happening again, we're level 2 and apparently the ability to hold the charge on a missed touch attack (something every spellcaster can do) and continue trying to land it indefinitely is OP now because "you can't do that with any other spells".
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This DM seems super dense.
 
Some DMs do confuse 'anything I'm not familiar with is OP.'

Then one switches to a straight-20 caster like wizard, uses textbook spell,s and blows the opposition out of the water.


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In other news the lineup from Pathfinder Bestiary 6 is out and it looks pretty interesting. One thing I like about Paizo is how they do continue to add multiple 0-HD PC races with each one, including the Lovecraft race Yaddithians (also Naiads and another new one). As a lover of exotic and varied PC races, it's a plus for me.

Aside from that, we got proteans, the fey wild hunt, less dragons than normal (yay!), the Krampus, etc..
 
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Q99 said:
Some DMs do confuse 'anything I'm not familiar with is OP.'

Then one switches to a straight-20 caster like wizard, uses textbook spell,s and blows the opposition out of the water.
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Once you get Persistent Spell and can start adding it to useful spells, combat becomes completely frickin' silly. Likewise with lots of other spells and metamagic Wizards and Sorcerers can make insanely good use out of.

Plus, at 17 level when you can make Gate railguns by either looping superheated plasma through a demiplane or opening portals to the center of the Plane of Fire/Positive Energy plane and pointing the portals at someone you want dead.
 
Has anyone here used the Gunslinger Fighter Archetype written up by Matt Mercer(the DM on Critical Role)? I'm thinking about probing my own DM in letting me use it, but I want to ask for advice.
 
So I came up with this in regards to making a Hex Dragon Villain.

The Dragon, Hexingblight is the descendant of the Dragon who came up with these.

Dragonscale Spellhold

The Dragonscale Spellholds are relics of ancient magic said to have been created by a powerful Hex Dragon obsessed with gaining more magical power.

Created through great effort and pain these artifacts allow a Dragon to gain mastery over any one of the stand School of Magic, allowing them access to all spells of that school on the Sorcerer spell list.

However gaining such incredible power is not without price.

First a Dragon must be at least an Adult to attempt the ritual, and in order to initiate it not only do they need to sacrifice no less then 100,000 GP worth of their Hoard (with at least one Rare Magical Item as a Catalyst) the Dragon must shed their bled over the scale they are using to create a Spellhold and enter a trance.

Through sheer will the Dragon must wrestle the primordial forces of Arcane Magic to their will and bind them to the scale. The wound they have created will continue to bleed until the ritual is completed, so if not completed in time the Dragon will die.

And if the ritual fails the Dragon will take half of their HP in a "backlash" of the failed ritual, as such if the danger of the Dragon conducting the ritual dying is very real if they struggle for hours on end only to fail or simply bleed out due to not having the skill to wield such power.

Needless to say few Dragons are willing to risk their lives and treasures for such power, but those who do gain an even greater ability.

The Dragonscale Spellhold can "absorb" the inscribed on Scrolls and in Spellbooks, though if these spells are not of the School of the Spellhold, and cannot be learned by a Sorcerer they cannot be "learned" by the Spellhold.

Fundamentally it allows a Dragon to "swap out" any spells it knows with those stored in the Spellhold. Afterwards the Dragon must enter a sleep of at least One Day by their Home World's Solar Cycle. During this mystically induced sleep they cannot be awakened by anything short of Magical means.

If a Spellhold is destroyed then the Dragon can recreate it by undergoing the ritual again. "Learned" Spells are lost, but any of the Dragon's "Naturally Gained" spells that were swapped out with other spells are stored in the new Spellhold.

It was later found by the Hex Dragon who created Dragonscale Spellholds that a Dragon can only have one, and trying to make more then one results in an explosion of magical energies that is always fatal.

Dragonscale Spellholds only work for their Creator, but even after their master's death the spells contained therein appear in tiny glowing Draconic Runes on the scale, and can serve as a Spellbook.

However these "Dead Spellholds" can only hold the number of spells equal to the ones known by a Dragon of the same age category that there maker was when they died. Which spells remain in the Spellhold and which are lost are entirely random.

Lesser Dragonscale Spellhold

An adventuring Sorceress of Gold Dragon descent named Ariel Spellweaver (her original name was Cobbler, she changed it to hide her peasant background) was part of a group that slew a Black Dragon who had a Spellhold in his possession, allowing Drowningcry as he was called to access Necromancy Spells, and by targeting and killing a nearby Pale Master he greatly expanded his repotoire with the stolen Necromancer's Spellbooks and Scrolls.

Ariel became obsessed with the power of the Dragonscale Spellhold and used up much of the fortune she accumulated as a successful adventure to try and recreate them.

Eventually she succeeded to a certain extent.

With a Scale of a Dragon of the same breed the Sorcerer is descended from the a Lesser Dragonscale Spellhold can be created.

However Ariel was far from satisfied with the results.

While the Lesser Spellholds retained the ability to Absorb spells from Scrolls and Spellbooks they did not possess the seemingly "unlimited" storage capacity, only holding the maximum number of Spells the creator can know, and half of these must at all times be of the School chosen at the Lesser Spellhold's creation.

Lesser Dragonscale Spellholds also do not have any spells stored in them upon their creation.

So while they greatly enhance the power of a Draconic Sorcerer, and even increase the number of spells they can hold as their creator gains experience much like the Sorcerers themselves their power is a pale shadow of what they descended from.

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So what should by the GP and EXP needed to Create a Lesser Dragonscale Spellhold?

I am thinking that it should be at the least equal to something like a masterwork magic item, as the creator can only have one.

The other part of the Plot is to have the Hex Dragon Villain becoming so obsessed with Magical Power that he believes that Dragons have "strayed" from their path.

So he creates a ritual he believes can make new forms of "Arcane Dragons" by having other Dragons loose an Age Rank and gain access to a School of Magic.

The Hex Dragon, Hexingblight, believes this will allow any offspring of these "Awakened Arcana" Dragons will possess these same abilities.

He is wrong, it would just be treated as a Prestige Class for Dragons like Runescaled Dragons are.

But Hexenblight is crazy and fully believes that Magical Power is the birthright of all Dragons, and that they have abandoned it in favor of treasures and physical power.

How does this all sound for a Sorcerer themed Adventure?

I really don't want the Spellholds to be to OP and would like some input on how to Nerf them if need be.
 
So, anyone here thought about optimizing the Tarrasque's feat, skill point and ability score increase allocations? The 3.5 one, mind you. The Tarrasque in 3.5 has a lot of feats to play with. And wasts almost a third of them on getting Toughness 6 times. Not Epic Toughness, regular Toughness. It has an (Ex) ability making the crit on it's bite 18-20, but lacks Improved Critical or Improved Natural Attack.
 
Anyone heard the Sahuagin hypothesis, that on most D&D worlds, that Sahuagin, in a rarity among evil species, have no intention of taking over the world?

Because they already do?
 
Sydonai said:
That's mostly because they usually give no shits about anything happening outside of the oceans.
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That, and the other aquatic races, really being no competition.

Merfolk stick to rocky shores and coral reefs mostly, fairly protected locations. Locathah, warm coastal waters and perhaps the biggest 'competition' but still only contest a relatively small area. Kua-toa, underdark waters, even less of a problem. Tritons don't like 'em and are reasonably strong... but are also known for really keeping to their settlements and being very territorial.

The exception? Sea elves, who are mostly nomadic, and... intelligence 8. To Sahuagin's 14. They have no great magic or defensive abilities or grand fortresses, and some Sahaugin look like them only stronger and smarter and with hidden claws (there's a fair argument that if you're born one of these mutants and you want to be in charge, you might be best off jumping ship, moving to a Sea Elf settlement, and becoming a great leader there, using your genius to protect 'em and get fawned over with rewards for it!).

Sahuagin are smart, organized, have strong natural abilities, are the most wide-spread aquatic humanoid race by far, and the only widespread 'competition' is less impressive than most surface races and Sahuagin have natural born infiltrators to them to boot.

The odd plan involving the surface- which to them might as well be the Sahara vs the rest of Africa, if you have the good parts why need it?- are merely checking out to see if there is some sort of grand surface-worlder army or plan to do something about the Sahuagin's largely uncontested domination of the world, but nope, even when things go south it's at most a few formidable individuals, no grand surface army like some paranoid Sahuagin fear must exist!
 
It also doesn't hurt that their god is essentially a hyper-intelligent fiendish Megalodon with divine spellcasting.
 
Q99 said:
Kua-toa, underdark waters, even less of a problem..
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Some Kua-toa actually live in deep trenches, Underdark Kua-toa consider them to be heretics but almost never encounter them.

Also, to anyone interested in the Sahuagin that hasn't heard of these yet;
The Sea Devils
Evil Tide
Night of the Shark
Sea of Blood

And an interesting note;
By 2nd Edition, Demogorgon's background began to incorporate things aquatic (hence his swim speed and association with Dagon). And while his 4E description mentions kuo-toa followers, earlier versions—including the 2nd Edition Monster Mythology—focus more on the vampiric ixixachitl:

Why he chose the ixixachitl to become his worshipers, and why that race of sentient rays has chosen to follow him, is very hard to determine. Demogorgon may wish to use the ixixachitl to further the ambitions of the tanar'ri in the Blood War, although how they could help him is not clear. What is known is that Demogorgon has a hatred of Sekolah the sahuagin god; some myths portray the tanar'ri as a one-time vassal of Sekolah, magically compelled to service through an artifact. Demogorgon does not direct ixixachitl attacks specifically at sahuagin, but he is pleased if his servants happen to find themselves in a position where sahuagin are the logical next target for their massed attacks.

From the ixixachitl's point of view, they may be gaining power from their association with Demogorgon-as is the tanar'ri lord himself. Through some strange warp in the Abyss, it may be that the actions of vampiric ixixachitl in energy draining victims (in sacrifices in many instances) somehow transfer magical energy to Demogorgon and strengthen him. This twist in the planar fabric may somehow amplify and transform this energy, and some of it appears to create a backlash on the ixixachitl, who have become more powerful spellcasters than they once were. The fact that vampiric ixixachitl alone can become the most powerful priests seems to support this hypothesis.
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Random question: How long does it take (in Pathfinder/3.5) for somebody to become a level 1 wizard? Apparently Human Starting page (via the Core Races starting age table from Pathfinder) is 15 + 2d6 years so I'm assuming the lowest your going to get is two years of study, but is that laid out anywhere else?
 
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